More problems with plastic bags

I'm sorry and saddened to be writing this post today. About a month ago a group of 7 sperm whales stranded on the shores of Foggia, Italy where they died. After being examined by the scientists there, it was determined that all 7 died from ingesting plastic bags. Here's a link to the article from United Press International UPI

Sperm whales are majestic creatures.  They normally grow to 50-60 feet and weigh in at 40-50 tons! But sadly plastic bags do not make size discriminations.  Plastic bags floating in the ocean are mistaken for food by many sea creatures.  They can resemble squid and jellyfish and they are consumed by wildlife.  Once consumed they can become entangled in the digestive tract of the animal and the animal dies as was the case with this group of sperm whales.

Here's a short video from the National Geographic chanel on YouTube

People we've got to realize that our oceans are not dumping grounds!  We need to become more aware of these plastic bags and where they are winding up.  I've read estimates that 80% of the plastic debris in our oceans has washed out from land through storm drains, creeks, streams and rivers.   They seem harmless enough lying about on land, but once these plastic bags make their way into our oceans, they become the right hand of death!

I fully support ideas like plastic bag bans and taxes to help us all reduce our use of plastic bags and help prevent further tragedies from taking place like these poor sperm whales.  The beautiful diversity of wildlife on our planet should not suffer for our convenience!

Plastic is not fantastic!

Ban the Bag!

Bring your own bag!

Reduce, Reuse, Recycle and Respect the Earth!

Bag ban, tax or recycling?

Original posting:
Tuesday, August 25, 2009

The city of Seattle recently took on the issue of plastic bags. A proposed 20 cent bag fee went to the voters. Unfortunately, but not suprisingly, this failed. The problem I think is that in the state of Washington our taxes are so high already. In this economy, people just couldn't imagine paying another fee, which was interpreted by many as another tax.

Now I don't live in Seattle, but I do support legislation that would help eliminate and reduce the ever growing problem of plastic bags. Many cities across the country and around the world are bringing these types of legislation to the table. In Edmonds, a waterfront city here in Washington State, a bag ban was passed and is going into effect in the next year. In New Dehli, India, a bag ban is in effect and in Ireland, there is a plasti-tax on bags which reduced their consumption of plastic bags by 90%.

I've had a lot of questions lately as to how I can support any of these types of legislation when my business is recycling plastic bags. The answer is simple really. The reason I started FatBottomBags is to reduce plastic bag use and plastic bags in our landfills and more importantly in our oceans. FatBottomBags is my recycling project and reducing plastic bags is my number one reason for making FatBottomBags from plastic bags.

I hope that someday plastic shopping bags will be banned in my area and when there are no longer plastic bags to be made into FatBottomBags I will gladly work in a different media!

I am supporting The world's first Plastic Bag Free Day will be on the 12th September 2009. Please join me on this day and make a statement about your commitment to bettering your environment. 24 hours + 0 plastic bags = doing a small thing to change the big picture!

I've printed up posters for my local bulliten board and you can do the same. Let's spread the word about reducing our use of plastic bags! For poster go to: http://www.adoptabeach.org.uk/downloads/aab/PBFD_Poster.pdf

International Plastic Bag Free Day

Original posting:
Wednesday, September 2, 2009


Mark your calendar...... there's a new holiday this month and you can celebrate it everyday. September 12, 2009 will be the first official celebration of International Plastic Bag Free Day!

As you may know, I make reusable bags out of "single-use" plastic shopping bags. You may wonder then, how can she support a plastic bag free day? The answer is simple. I began creating FatBottomBags in an effort to reduce the amount of plastic bags that are going to the landfills or worse than that, winding up in our oceans!

International Plastic Bag Free Day is easy enough to participate in. Just take this one day out of your normal routine. Use a reusable bag for one day and you'll see how great it feels to help our earth. Once you get hooked on the feeling of being a positive change, you may find yourself celebrating a plastic bag free month, year or lifetime!!!!

This day is sponsored by the Marine Conservation Society based in the UK, but it is meant to be celebrated across the globe. They even have a beautiful poster you can print out at home and then plaster up in your community to spread the word! I placed one on our community bulliten board with a request for any new contributors who would like me to recycle their plastic bags!

So far, with the help of my customers and contributors, I've been able to keep over 3500 plastic bags out of the waste stream! Just think how many you can eliminate by making this easy change to reusable bags.

Remember to reduce, reuse, recycle and respect our environment, because when we all do our small part we can change the big picture!