Beachcombing

Beachcombing is an activity that consists of an individual "combing" (or searching) the beach and the intertidal zone, looking for things of value, interest or utility.

The first appearance of the word "beachcombers" in print was in Richard Henry Dana Jr.'s Two Years Before the Mast (1840) and later referenced in Herman Melville's Omoo (1847).

While the vast majority of beachcombers were simply unemployed sailors, many may have chosen to live in Pacific island communities;[2][3][4] as described by Herman Melville in Typee, or Harry Franck in the book Vagabonding Around the World.

After enduring a voyage of danger and hardship, it was not uncommon for a few sailors to desert a whaling ship when it arrived in Tahiti or the Marquesas and reside, at least for a while, in the South Sea islands of Polynesia.

Charles Savage led a small group of beachcombers as mercenaries in the service of the Bau Island chieftain Naulivou and quickly showed their worth in fights with his enemies.

The Russian word бич (and a rarer form бичкомбер, бичкомер) appeared not later than 1930s, in the sense of temporarily unemployed sailor, hanging about in the port and living from hand to mouth; nowadays it means a vagabond or a hobo.

[18] Sophisticated recreational beachcombers use knowledge of how storms, geography, ocean currents, and seasonal events determine the arrival and exposure of rare finds.

[19][20] They also practice eco-conservation and do not kill mollusks for their shells, dig holes in the sand, or gouge cliff faces for fossils or reefs for coral specimens.

[21] Many beachcombers serve as excellent stewards of the seashore, working with government agencies to monitor shore erosion, dumping and pollution, and reef and cliff damage, etc.

A popular Canadian family television drama, The Beachcombers, focused on a two-man business salvaging logs from beaches in late-twentieth-century British Columbia.