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Home - How is Sea Glass Made How is Sea Glass Made?How is Marooned on an island, he throws a bottle into the ocean...in time, it winds up broken on a rocky shore, the note lost forever - a possible but unlikely source of sea glass!
Old Glass Bottles/ Colored Glass Bottles / Recycled Glass BottlesThe nicely-tumbled glass with the frosted but glowing colors that we easily recognize as sea or beach glass likely came from a much more humble source - the trash dump.Since glass is the longest lasting item in an old trash dump (doesn't rust or decompose), most of the sea glass begins its life as old glass bottles, including those beautiful colored glass bottles, and then it ends up right where it should be - on the beach, where it takes on a new life as recycled glass bottles, that is, beach glass (including lake glass or sea glass). How is Sea Glass Made - Old Glass BottlesThe origin of sea glass began with what was once bottles, jars, glassware, dinnerware, et cetera.It usually ended up in bodies of water as garbage (possibly broken so no longer useful) or possibly because of boats being grounded in storms. For home dwellers that lived close by the sea or lakes, that was as good a place as any to get rid of their refuse. Years ago, people weren't too concerned about the environment, so a lot of junk and garbage was dumped into the oceans and lakes.
Another way that the "raw material " for beach glass finds its way to the beach is from boats.Trash, believe it or not, is still regularly dumped into ocean waters from many large and small seagoing vessels. Just like in the old stories of someone marooned on an island who puts a note in a bottle and throws it out in the current and someone on the other side of the world finds it, corked bottles will float a long way. Amazingly, uncorked bottles can float long distances also. These bottles may find their way to the beach, where they are busted up when the waves hit the rocks or other objects. Glass floats are still being used in fishing nets. Nets get old and torn. The glass floats come loose. Some of the more unusual colors you might find may come from these floats. Recycled Glass Bottles Glass found along shipping lanes can often come from
sailors throwing bottles into the sea (no longer done, of
course!). There are also interesting pieces of glass from oriental fishing floats that have broken up on the beach. How is sea glass made...The shards from these various sources have been tumbling around in the water, sometimes for decades, before finding their way onto a given beach at a given time. Over time, nature takes what was once man's garbage and turns it into sparkling natural gems - naturally recycled glass.. This process is the result of wave action tumbling the shards among rocks and sand between the tide lines. Tides, in a twice a day cycle, cover and uncover that glass, exposing all sides to sunlight and, with the passage of time, some of the components of the glass are leached by the water around it, resulting in that frosted look that identifies genuine tumbled sea glass. The amount of wave action directly affects how quickly a shard will become real sea glass. Sea glass/seaglass shards could take from 5-50 or more years to become that true object of natural art and beauty that we so love. Click here for detailed description of the factors involved. Colored Glass Bottles We have met people on the beach who've been collecting sea glass for over 30 years. There's something so alluring about walking on the shore and finding a piece of sea glass. For some, collecting sea glass is closely tied up with fond memories of childhood, family visits to the beaches, solitary walks alone. For others, it's trying to figure out where the sea glass came from - what's the history of that particular piece of sea glass - how old is it. For them, that's half the fun of it. Imagination - The Mystery of How is Sea Glass MadeMo matter how you much you can guess at, in most cases you'll never really know where your piece of beach glass came from - or what it went through to become what it is now.It's kind of like solving a mystery - how is sea glass made, how'd this particular piece come to be what it is. It's something we never get tired of doing. What we find today is what keeps us going back tomorrow.
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