Stones along the beach in Charles Daley Park are always interesting and intriguing. It got me thinking about how we used to collect beach glas. There isn't nearly as much as there used to be, and I presume that has to do with pollution prevention and waste recycling. I found a fascinating article explaining this HERE. Below are two excerpts:
"The reasons so much glass has got into large bodies of water vary. For millennia, glass entered the water from shipwrecks whose cargo spilled across the ocean floor. Until the London Convention on the Prevention of Marine Pollution was implemented between 1972 and 1975, ocean dumping of municipal waste was essentially unregulated. Until well into the 20th century, many towns and cities maintained municipal dump sites on or near lakes or oceans: the famous Glass Beach near Fort Bragg, California, a favourite tourist destination for coastal visitors, received tons of glass from local landfills operating between 1906 and 1967."
"Toronto might seem an unlikely place to find beach glass. But much of the city’s contemporary shoreline consists of land filled in with construction rubble and waste; in addition, some 141 former dump sites dot the city, many along now-filled-in ravines. In the decades before public recycling programs began, glass was a significant component of the waste stream, and over the course of a century, quite a lot of it washed into Lake Ontario. Conditions in Lake Ontario near Toronto — including good “fetch” (wide stretches of open water sufficient for significant wind-generated waves) and strong longshore drift currents — are also conducive to producing good beach glass."
It is still possible to find beach glass, but not in the quantities of the past. If we head over to eBay, one can buy lots beach glass in single or mixed colours, just like you combed the beach yourself.
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