Dave was only 8 years old when he began spending his weekends at the coast, catching peelers at ‘the spit’. Under the watchful eye of grandma, looking on from the beach as he surfed, Dave turned into an ocean addict forever. He had caught the surfing bug.
“It was the first time I really remember being stoked,” he laughs. “I barely even noticed the howling southerly!”
Ever since then, Dave has made sure he’s stayed near the coast. Holidays, Uni and work, all chosen based on their proximity to waves.
“I’ve always designed my life to live near the ocean so I can go surfing. I’m happy to live wherever… as long as there’s surf,” he says with a grin.
Although he spent weekends at the beach, during the week Dave’s family lived on a farm near Bungendore. Between planting trees on the farm and playing in the ocean on weekends, Dave grew up with an appreciation for nature.
“I’ve got a fairly environmentally conscious family, so I think it just evolved. It was always in the back of my mind,” he says.
It wasn’t until Uni that Dave started to realise the intrinsic link between the sport he loved and the nature he’d always cared about.
“When I started having a better understanding of ecological systems… it all started to sort of fall into place,” he says.
Now, at 37, he does everything he can in his life to minimise his own impact, from using recycled tail pads, leg ropes, wetsuits and boards, to having a worm farm, recycling and minimising plastic use. But the problems facing the ocean still worry him.
“The biggest threat to my lifestyle by the ocean would be climate change,” Dave explains. ‘The changes that could occur … in the long term are going to totally change our coastlines.”
Predicted sea level rise of .59m by the end of this century, will have a vast effect on the surfing community. Not only is there danger of inundation of parts of the coastal fringe, the redistribution of sediment along sandy areas means our favourite local river mouths or sandbars could be lost forever.
And it’s not just Australia that is under threat. Indonesia, one of Dave’s favourite surfing destinations, is home to some of the lowest lying, most densely populated cities in the world, at risk of rising sea levels.
But Indonesia has more problems than just rising seas. Despite the picture perfect waves, beneath the surface isn’t anywhere near as glamorous.
“The plastics thing for surfing is a huge [issue]. I was in Indonesia last week and you keep picking up bits of rubbish and bits of rubbish and… it just keeps coming and coming,” says Dave. “That’s why I recycle all our plastic and we try not to use too much.”
When it comes to plastics in the ocean, otherwise known as Marine Debris, the statistics are staggering. An estimated 18,000 pieces of plastic floats in every square kilometer of ocean and 276 marine species worldwide are impacted by marine debris.
Not only is it devastating for marine life, it also makes for a seriously unpleasant surfing experience. For Dave, plucking rubbish from the ocean is automatic.
“I’ve always got pieces of rubbish [I’ve found] stuffed up my wettie sleeve when I’m surfing,” he says laughing.
Despite Dave’s habits, he worries that not all surfers see the connection between protecting the ocean and surfing.
“I would say it’s a minority in the lineup that have an awareness of their footprint as a surfer or the environmental issues facing the world at the moment and what the ramifications could be on them,” he says.
Enormously successful campaigns such as Surfaid have shown that surfers have the capacity to care deeply about humanitarian issues close to the heart of the surfing community. Dave hopes the same can be achieved with ocean conservation.
“I think they would care more if they knew,” says Dave. “In general surfers are passionate people so it’s just getting the message out there… it needs to come from the big business of surfing.”
At the moment, most environmentally friendly surf products come with a premium. Dave considers himself one of the lucky ones, able to afford environmentally friendly products wherever there's an option to. But for things like non-petroleum based surfboards to become mainstream, he says surfers and business need to be ‘on board’, so to speak.
“Because surfing’s so dominated by performance in general… until the boards are proved to be on par in performance, they’ll never get a foothold in the market,” he says. “The surfing industry’s a long way behind… But they’re coming along.”
Dave doesn’t just want to maintain and protect his lifestyle, he also wants to show appreciation for the life he’s been able to lead at the hands of the ocean.
“It’s just the philosophy of giving back,” he says. “If you’ve got an opportunity to participate in these sports and activities, you should give back to them and give back to the environment that you’re doing it in.”
“My favourite session of all time would have to be last May with my brother, surfing 8 foot, un-crowded, grinding barrels at G Land, on our first ever trip together,” he says smiling.
In the end, Dave is like most surfers. All he really wants to do is continue being a surfer, and to continue chasing the perfect Indonesian barrel… on a recycled board of course.