Fossicking

After many visits to the spot on the estuary edge in search of smoothed shards of pottery and glass, I've worked out that the reason for their proliferation in this one particular spot is not that they were washed there by the tides, accumulating in a backwash or eddy, but because they were dumped there long ago, as household rubbish. Biffed over the bank these bottles were perhaps whole when they were dumped, the pottery maybe intact. Many years later, at the point when I am fossicking the tiny beaches, they are small remnants only, shaped by time and the jiggle provided by tides and waves. It's a lot more glamorous finding the little gems now than I imagine it would have been when the hiffing was done, so I count myself lucky, but still believe it's wrong to jettison our unwanted materials thoughtlessly. Here are the results of my afternoon; pretty little things captured in my camera.