Our Irish Sea

Join us

Marine Mudness Campaign
Support protected areas of our sea and coast by becoming a Friend of muddy Marine Conservation Zones
Become a Marine Champion
Are you passionate about our Irish Sea? We are looking for enthusiastic volunteers who would like to learn the skills needed to inspire others to join in the campaign to protect our marine environment
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Marine education
From basking sharks to brittlestars - raising awareness about the huge diversity of life in the Irish Sea through marine education and interpretation, events, Beach School and scientific survey work
Help us complete the picture
There is an incomplete network of Marine Conservation Zones in the Irish Sea. We need to fill in the gaps.
Eleanor Stone

Over the next three years the Wildlife Trust for Lancashire, Manchester and North Merseyside will deliver a programme of inspirational and engaging marine activities that will raise awareness about how important the marine life of our Irish Sea is.

Working closely with local schools, Our Irish Sea will help children to explore their coastline more by getting them out on the shore to investigate the huge diversity of marine life that can be found along the North West coast of England.

We will be engaging with a wide range of people through family-focused activities at Liverpool World Museum, Blackpool Sealife Centre, Liverpool’s green spaces and along the beautiful beaches of the Sefton and Fylde coasts. In addition we'll be working closely with local naturalist groups and coastal communities to recruit and train volunteers to become Marine Champions to lead activities, carry out essential survey work and contribute to our campaigns.

As most of Liverpool Bay’s diverse wildlife is hidden beneath the waves, the best way to survey the Irish Sea is on beaches and in harbours. Working alongside LOVEmyBEACH we will carry out Shoresearches to record both our rocky shore species and the vast array of marine life that washes up on the strandline.

We will also delve below the surface to uncover our sand and mud dwellers, ensuring that our marine species are recorded with Merseyside BioBank. Not forgetting our larger marine fauna (whales, dolphins and seals) we will also conduct Seawatches in partnership with the Seawatch Foundation. All these records are essential in our campaign work lobbying for more Marine Conservation Zones in the Irish Sea and protection and better management of our marine environment for the future.

With the support of our funders and partners we aim to uncover some of the mysteries of the Irish Sea whilst inspiring new generations to get involved in protecting our fascinating marine wildlife.

What we are aiming to achieve

Our aim is an Irish Sea bustling with life, from delicate, mud-dwelling sea pens to boisterous bottlenose dolphins surfing the waves. Where marine wildlife thrives, from the depths of the ocean to the coastal shallows.

Recent surveys have shown that not many people are aware of the threats to our marine environment and in the North West the Irish Sea has often been misrepresented as muddy and lifeless.

It is a hugely important area for both humans and wildlife and those muddy waters have an incredible amount of biodiversity beneath the surface. This has been particularly evident with recent sightings of humpback whales, dolphins and green turtles in the area, proving that there is an abundance of food for even the largest species. The consequences which further damage to our seas could have to our marine species are devastating....

Therefore, we must inspire and engage people with our marine environment in order to build a lasting connection that will encourage them to support our campaigning for its protection. It is vital that we involve young people in surveying the coastline for evidence of wild and wonderful creatures as these youngsters will become the future guardians of our Irish Sea and we must make the search interesting for our junior wildlife detectives.

How you can help

We are looking for enthusiastic volunteers who would like to become Marine Champions for Our Irish Sea and learn the skills needed to inspire others to join in the campaign to protect our marine environment.