These colorful "little gems" turned from garbage are gradually disappearing from the beaches

Produced by: Science Popularization China

Author: Earth's Gravity (Popular Science Creator)

Producer: China Science Expo

Whenever we walk on the beach, we may like to look for some unexpected treasures on the beach, such as beautiful shells, coral reefs, stranded starfish, or small crabs hiding under the sand.

Shells are one of the treasures that many people must find on the beach.

(Image source: pexels)

However, in addition to these little treasures, we may also find some sparkling colorful "little gems" on the beach. They usually look like this:

Sea glass on the beach

(Image source: Wikipedia)

Is this glass?

Sea glass: a treasure polished by nature

These "little gems" are actually called **"sea glass"**. They were originally glass bottles discarded by people, and after being transformed by nature, they became precious "treasures".

As these glass bottles drift in the waves, they gradually break after being washed by the waves for a long time, and then the action of the ocean causes these fragments to slide and roll on the sandy seabed. It is this movement that smoothes the sharp edges of the glass, making them slowly rounded and finally polished due to the constant friction between them and the sand.

Since many glass bottles are actually colored, these sea glasses will also retain their original colors and have a unique appearance due to being polished by the ocean - some are polished to be extremely smooth, so they are transparent and shiny; some have dense scratches and appear matte or translucent; and some will have special shell-like fractures due to collisions, making the entire sea glass more vicissitudes of life.

The vicissitudes of sea glass

(Image credit: Flickr/ Joe Shlabotnik)

The origins of a lot of sea glass can be traced back to before the 20th century, when many of the most commonly used objects in people's lives were made of glass - glass windows, glass bottles, glass plates, glass bowls, etc.

But at that time, the West, especially the American residents, often threw these glass products into the garbage dump as disposable items. At that time, many garbage dumps were set up near rivers or bays. With the washing of rain or waves, the garbage naturally flowed into the river or ocean, starting their long journey from garbage to treasure.

It is said to be a long process because it often takes decades or even hundreds of years for a piece of glass to change from angular glass fragments into round and beautiful sea glass.

Some sea glass, if we have the ability to test its age, can even be traced back hundreds of years.

Many glass products will drift in the ocean for decades or even hundreds of years before they are broken into sea glass.

(Image source: Wikipedia)

Is sea glass good or bad?

It is precisely because of the large-scale dumping of garbage by people that many glass beaches composed almost entirely of sea glass have appeared all over the world.

For example, a bay in MacKerricher State Park in California, USA, is the famous Glass Beach attraction. This attraction was formed mainly because between 1906 and 1967, the nearby waterfront communities dumped all kinds of garbage into this bay, including glass, electrical appliances, and even cars.

After 1967, the landfill was closed. Various metal products were gradually taken away by the local government, but the broken glass remained there and was polished into its current appearance by decades of seawater.

America's Glass Beach is made almost entirely of sea glass

(Image source: Wikipedia)

Although these sea glass pieces were garbage in the past, they have now become the favorites of many people (at least in the United States). Collecting and selling sea glass has become a multi-million dollar industry. Many people design beautiful sea glass jewelry (such as necklaces, earrings, bracelets and rings, etc.) or collectibles. People have even established various sea glass associations to hold exhibitions to promote sea glass as a new fashion.

However, despite its growing popularity, sea glass is still facing a dwindling supply as single-use plastics and aluminum products become more prevalent, replacing traditional glass bottles and causing more other types of waste to enter the ocean.

Disappearing sea glass

Take the Glass Beach in the United States mentioned in the previous article as an example. Due to the continuous erosion of sea water and the collection of tourists, the sea glass on the beach is constantly decreasing. The local sea glass protection organization is even considering launching an activity to throw glass garbage into the ocean here to replenish the sea glass on the beach.

Plastic is replacing glass as waste on beaches

(Photo source: veer photo gallery)

Moreover, due to the increasing use of disposable plastics, there is an increasing amount of plastic waste on the beach. These wastes will not be polished by the waves and turned into beautiful small objects, but will slowly accumulate on a beach or gather in the ocean due to their long degradation time, which will put the marine ecosystem into crisis and turn the originally beautiful beaches into new garbage dumps full of white garbage.

Conclusion

Although we know that sea glass is also human waste and a product of human irresponsibility towards the environment, after being washed by nature and transformed by humans, sea glass has indeed been able to have new possibilities in human society. Therefore, next time you walk on the beach, please cherish these little gems, because maybe we will hardly see them again next time.