Brown seaweed helping Jersey ecosystem

Brown seaweed is part of a "normal, healthy beach"

Piles of brown seaweed washing up on some Jersey beaches are helping the island's ecosystem, a government environment boss has said.

Rough seas and strong winds earlier in August led to it washing up on the beaches of Havre des Pas and St Ouen's Bay.

Bruce Labey, head of Jersey's Parks, Gardens and Cleaning Services, said it would get washed out again soon.

Mr Labey also said the seaweed was no risk to the public.

'Normal, healthy beach'

He said: "It's perfectly natural and normally it floats off with the next tide that can lift it up, so it's not something we normally intervene with, the seaweed actually forms part of the ecosystem of a normal, healthy beach.

"We get the brown stuff piling up on Havre des Pas and St Ouen and we've got some big tides coming on Thursday and Friday, and the wind is also being extremely co-operative and is blowing from the north east, so that should hopefully clear it all."