North Shore beaches known for sun, sea, surf and seaweed

English tourist Florence Wakeman reads a book on Takapuna beach surrounded by a mass of washed up seaweed. Picture / Martin Sykes

A clean-up is under way at nine North Shore beaches after last week's easterly storm buried them under a mass of seaweed.

The North Shore City Council hired a drainage company to start the clean-up after last Wednesday's storm. It is scheduled to be finished by the long weekend.

Council operations manager Mike Weaver said the North Shore tended to get a lot of seaweed after big storms. "There's that much that it becomes a bit of a health and safety issue."

Seaweed is up to half a metre deep on some beaches and has a strong fishy smell that attracts flies.

One Milford man rang the council to say it was the worst case of seaweed he had seen in 70 years.

Mr Weaver admitted it was an "extremely bad" case.

The council assesses the North Shore beaches daily. Mr Weaver said it knew there was a storm coming last week and so was ready to react.

The seaweed cannot be recycled because it often contains a lot of sand and debris, so it is being taken to the rubbish dump.

About 200 tonnes of seaweed was gathered from Takapuna Beach last Thursday.

However, by Friday morning, tonnes more had washed up on to the beach.

Mr Weaver said the seaweed had probably stopped people from swimming. "We want to limit that because the North Shore beaches are very popular during the summer."

Florence Wakeman from Birmingham, England, was relaxing on Takapuna Beach yesterday, reading a book among the seaweed.

"The mess is so disgusting that my husband wanted to write a letter [to the council] about it," she said.

Ms Wakeman had been to Mairangi Bay earlier in the day as she used to live there and loved the beach. However, it was "smothered in seaweed" so she went to Takapuna instead.

"It's just as bad here, though. It's such a pity."