How You Can Help Restore the Sand Dunes at Saline Beach in St Barths
Saline Beach is often on the list of “most beautiful beaches in the Caribbean” for good reason. It’s long, gentle crescent shores don’t have a single house, hotel or restaurant on them. Plus, the surrounding mountains provide a sense of protected calm. On September 6, 2017 hurricane Irma swept over St Barths. The storm surge damaged the natural dunes of Saline beach. Another storm surge could breach the dunes and flood the valley behind them, damaging homes and area restaurants like Grain de Sel and L’Esprit de Saline.
The non-profit group Make St. Barths Green Again is leading the effort to restore the dunes. The natural restoration would have taken decades so Make St. Barths Green Again is stepping in to bring the beautiful beach back into its prime, and it needs your help. To make a donation to support this project please visit the Make-St-Barths-Green-Again GoFundMe page here: https://www.gofundme.com/make-st-barths-greenagain .
The full details about the Saline beach dune restoration project can be found below:
Bruno de Courreges, the founder of the non-profit describes the work this way:
“The dune had been fragilized in 3 places, where it had become lower and thinner. Another hurricane with big waves could come break the dune, making it easy for sea water to rush into the Grande Saline area. Local people living close by would be threatened. Moreover, the strength of the currents would mean that the gape would get larger, making it almost impossible to shut. So, in agreement with the local authorities (la Collectivité de Saint Barthélemy) and with the environmental agency (Agence Territoriale de l’Environnement), the Make St Barths Green Again team on the ground planned this work for months. Now that it is low season in St Barths, before the return of hurricane season in September, it it time to act. You will find photos and videos below, along with a few comments to let you understand what has been done.”
The team that “Make St Barths Green Again” hired began transporting the wooden barriers and wooden posts.
Then the deployment of the barriers started.
Make St. Barths Green Again Says:
“We would like to thank all of our donators, the local authorities and the people on the ground for coming together to make this come true. Also, thank you to local friends and to international visitors for their patience this Summer while a chunk of the beach was inaccessible while the dune and plants grew back.”
A second team has immediately started replanting « patates de bord de mer », these sand creepers which are the first species we use to maintain sand before planting larger plants and trees.
The Collectivité has posted an information about the project and made a decision forbidding the access to the east side of the beach.
Without the generosity of the people who have supported this campaign, nothing would have been possible. To make a donation to support this project please visit the Make-St-Barths-Green-Again GoFundMe page here: https://www.gofundme.com/make-st-barths-greenagain
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