Cleanup in the Mangrove Jungle

Not Just Trash—But Mosquitoes, Mud, and Mangroves

     That morning, the 4ocean ocean team set out under a cloudy sky, bound for a patch of coastline choked with rising tidewater. With rain falling lightly and the sea swelling fast, our captain, Wahyudi, decided to shift the day’s focus from the mangroves to the beachline. At high tide, trash often floats deep into mangrove roots and becomes nearly impossible to retrieve—especially in water reaching 2.5 meters deep.

     Crews split up quickly. Dugong and Ponton headed north; the rest pushed south into the thickets of the surrounding islands. We followed the northern group as they swept the shoreline for signs of waste. After a half hour, the team docked along a quiet stretch behind a small hotel, where mangroves lined the shore. There wasn’t much to clean—but just a little farther along, at a site known to locals for collecting debris, we struck plastic.

Despite the bites and swatting, the work carried on. No one backed down. The team cleared what they could over the course of two solid hours, waist-deep in roots and brackish water. By late afternoon, with the sun low and the bugs relentless, the captain made the call to head back. But we weren’t done—we’d return the next morning to finish the job.

The team collected 4,397.13 pounds of debris from the mangrove shoreline. Most of it consisted of single-use plastics—bottles, bags, straws—as well as discarded fish feed sacks and damaged fishing nets. Many of these items were entangled within the mangrove roots, blocking water flow and creating stagnant pools—ideal conditions for mosquito breeding and a direct threat to the health of the ecosystem.

     Despite the conditions, crew morale remained high. Members reminded each other to hydrate, moved cautiously through difficult terrain, and even helped swat mosquitoes off one another between loads. This wasn’t just cleanup—it was shared effort and camaraderie under pressure.

     “In the middle of all that sweat and swatting, you realize this work connects us,” one team member said. “Not just to each other, but to the land and the life it supports.”

     The team faced multiple layers of difficulty:

• High tide submerged parts of the mangrove zone, making it hard to reach floating debris.
• Remote location meant long travel hours and limited working time, with the team needing to head back before nightfall.
• Narrow mangrove channels made equipment transport and sack collection logistically difficult.