No, I'm not actually Mexican. I beach comb and collect seeds that wash ashore from other lands, like the hamburger bean (right). 
Cocoa Beach is a good location for finding drift seeds as well as host of the annual International Seabean Symposium. People bring their collections from near and far to discuss finding, polishing, growing, sharing, crafting, etc. Some are lucky, some mystical, some make great jewelry or art . This is my collection. Yeah, i know, "get a life". But there's plenty of science here.Sea-beans (also known as drift seeds) are seeds and beans that are carried to the ocean, often by freshwater streams and rivers, then drift with the ocean currents and (hopefully!) wash ashore.
(These i found in an hour or two on vacation on Costa Rica's west coast near Dominical.) Seabeans get caught up in the global currents much like the garbage that collects in the pacific gyre where there is a floating island of plastic twice as big as the state of Texas.
(WARNING! not for environmentally sensitive viewers)
The Great Pacific Garbage Patch! - The bulk of it will
not decompose in the traditional sense. Exposure to sunlight will eventually break it down into small pieces that will make it more likely to be consumed by wildlife like sea birds and fish which leads to death of the animal. Furthermore, plastic pieces can absorb toxic chemicals, which migrate up the food chain and eventually make it to humans. For every pound of plankton there are as many as six pounds of marine litter. Sad but true.
