Building your own reef???

[Bwgan]

Just a thought that me and a few friends had over the weekend whilst being bored waiting for the tide to drop. Would it be possible to build a 'reef' type structure out of sand bags? Obviously it would have to be marked with a bouy etc to make it safe for boats, but would it in theory work? As there is a beach where I live that is always deserted and boats never go there and it always picks up a bit of swell on a Westerly - Northerly wind????

[Dec]

A few places have put artificial reefs in.
The onlyone I have surfed is NarrowNeck in the goldcoast. Bit sketchy and shallow but if it was in an area where close-out days and crappy shifty beach breaks ruled it might be a good idea.

The ones the put in so far i know about about are narrowneck, australia and The mount, North Island New Sheepland..uuh I mean New Zealand..
Both are a waste of money because there are plenty of great breaks around that

[drowningbitbybit]

Cant see why you couldnt at least make a 'sandbank'

Wait til a very very low tide, pile in there with the sandbags, run away as the tide comes back in. Surf your own personal sandbank

Doubt it would last long though.

Driving an old car full of sandbags, and letting down the tires, would work too. Bit environmentally unfriendly though!

[Bwgan]

Thats pretty much what the plan was, minus the car! Build a bit of a wall with the sand bags and then fill it beach side with rocks and pebbles. Just a thought, but no my mind is racing! Maybe we could charge people to ride it! No I can shout 'My wave' like all the local jerks do, because I would have built it mwahahahahahahahahahaha!

[IdRatherBeSurfing]

wouldnt the sand bank have to be rather large, and long, to get a decent wave?

hire a digger for the day and build it with that

[drowningbitbybit]

wouldnt the sand bank have to be rather large, and long, to get a decent wave?

Nah, not at all. Look at a decent beach break when its got decent sandbanks and its not as if they're massive structures in the sand - just a 'not very flat' bit of beach. If you're surfing a waist high swell, for instance, you'd only need to make it a couple of foot high at most. Got to be worth a go!

[kitesurfer]

Alternatively ask jo for some of her empty beer barrels. I'm sure she's got enough kicking around to make a very large reef out of!!!!

[libby]

Please dont do anything to mess up marine ecosystems anymore. My whole dissertation is about humand messing up sandy shores and its very depressing.

Fair enough, one little reef wont make much difference but imagine if everyone starts trying it

Doubt it would work anyway, they've had to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars on the one at Mt Maunganui and its benefits are somewhat dubious or so im told.

[Old Guys Rule]

I hope you have a lot of friends. That is a huge amount of sand to move.

[Dec]

Don't screw the envorment up!

speaking of eco friendly stuff....I am going to a cool GreenSpirit festival concert...now that should have a lot of green enviro friendly....

[Driftingalong]

I would say "how 'bout NO, you goofy bast.ard" (in my best Austin Powers voice)...for lots of reasons...

for one (besides those stated above) - sand bags won't hold up over any length of time in the ocean...

[tomcat360]

Yeah, Cape Hatteras is living proof of that.

What again did they use in New Zealand?

[Dec]

Maybe some concrete?

Maybe you should chain yourself up infront of the local government houses and protest untill they agree to build an artificial reef? ooh bring some chips, a can of coke, and a laptop..to keep us updated?!

[libby]

They used fancy sandbags in NZ Tomcat

[sal]

what's the point in using fancy ones? if they're underwater, no-one's gonna see 'em anyway!

[drowningbitbybit]

what's the point in using fancy ones? if they're underwater, no-one's gonna see 'em anyway!

Happy fishes

[Lisa*]

they're building one in Bournemouth... as u look @ the sea 2 the left of i fink it's called Boscombe pier

It's gna b finished in i fink they sed 2/3 years... thers a big appartment block and sport centre being built wiv it i fink :S

gd idea

Lisa.x

[CheeZee]

" Go for it my man !!! .. i'd have a look at throwing a few sandbags in at lowtide before going crazy with it , just to see what difference a single layer will make as the tide comes in . Then go back and hit it hard with your buddies .. man how exciting would that be waiting for the tide to come in to see the first 'Bwgan wave' rise up out of no where

Even if it didnt last any longer than one day .. it would be worth the effort just to creatively waste time bro

And totally hearing ya Libstar on the eco' side of things but as long as the sandbags were made from hemp and not synthetic then surely they couldnt create a catastrophe. I know the change to the local eco system could throw things out of sync a wee bit but it could equally do some good ..who knows !

Sounds like fun but go carefull mate .. dont wanna hear that they had to come fly you outta there like a cockle picker

[Bwgan]

Wow, quite a few different responses, some for and some against and some uncalled for:

[quote="Driftingalong"]I would say "how 'bout NO, you goofy bast.ard" (in my best Austin Powers voice)...quote] Cheers for that!

I wouldn't worry about mucking up ecosystems or anything like as the council did that ages ago. The beach is pretty xxxxx, huge sea defences and two falling down piers used to ship off limestone to all over the world.

As I said, we were talking about it!

If anything ever comes of it we'll take pics and I'll let you know what happens

[CheeZee]

...lol.. man im nearly up for volunteering !!! ( i was the kid that dammed the local river just to see what would happen).. so it sounds like a ferkin greeeeeaaaaat idea to me !

.. if it happens you have deffo got to take some piccies for us

( cheezee leaves the room whistling the theme tune from " The Dambusters " lolol )