Dungeness

Lydd Ranges are situated on the reclaimed land of the historic Romney Marsh and part of the cuspate foreland at Dungeness, estimated to be between 3,000 and 5,000 years old. The habitats are of international importance and are part of the Dungeness Special Area of Conservation. The ranges have been used for military training for over 150 years.

Lydd Ranges are used for live firing with a danger area extending out to sea. Red flags are flown in periods of live firing during which access is prohibited along the foreshore and Galloway’s Road. When there is no live firing access is possible along a permissive path that runs along the coast. We always seek permission from the MoD to carry out our surveys. We plan to survey the same area on a monthly basis once it is safe to meet up and go out again.

Our surveys here involve a 30-minute walk along the shingle from Galloway’s car park, a 2 hour (ish) survey, and then we pick up anything else we can carry on the walk back. For these events, it is important we stay together and follow the safety rules.

You can see some of our past Dungeness events here.

July 2019

We successfully undertook the second survey at this remote beach, the aim being that the survey area is far enough away from large amounts of regular beach visitors and so the data recorded will give a more realistic idea of exactly what is washing up.

September 2019

This survey was part of the Marine Conservation Society’s annual Great British Beach Clean project, which in itself is part of World Ocean Cleanup Weekend. 7.5 kg of rubbish was removed from the survey area, and included 182 pieces, 82% of which were plastic: 27% from the public, 38% fishing and 8% from shipping. A huge thank you to everyone who took part.

January 2020

Thank you everyone for your effort in the survey and taking a whopping 154kg off the beach and out of the marine environment. It turned out to be quite cold but still not as wet or freezing as it could have been! The survey area of 100m by 35m gave 945 pieces of manmade rubbish at a weight of 38kg. 85% of this was plastic. We are uploading the results to the Marine Conservation Society as part of their national data, which in turn is used as part of the OSPAR data for NW Europe.

We also found 6 items as confirmed transatlantic debris (fishing and container spill) as well as remains of more local container spills. 

February 2020

The monthly Dungeness survey and clean up produced another 84 kg. A huge thank you to all the brave volunteers who managed this in challenging conditions. The Environment Agency have been re-profiling the beach and our normal survey site had been cleared, so any rubbish either covered up or washed away. The marine debris survey was carried out at a nearby site and all data will be uploaded to the Marine Conservation Society as part of the international campaign to record plastic pollution.