Active discussions

Please or to access all these features

Talk
AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

Less Salt in the sea

38 replies

SharkBaitOooHaha · 03/07/2025 18:16

Discussing this with a friend today. I grew up in London 1980s and every summer holiday as a child we’d go to Leyesdown. I clearly remember the smell of the sea, it smelt strongly of salt. I have been to Hastings and Cambersands recently and that salty smell has gone, my friend (who hasn’t been to the beach) thinks I must be losing my sense of smell, maybe I am.. Why else would the smell have changed, anyone else noticed this?

OP posts:
New posts on this thread. Refresh page
PorridgeAndSyrup · 04/07/2025 20:11

SharkBaitOooHaha · 04/07/2025 20:07

I think it was more likely seaweed, the air near the sea is salty though.. You can taste it, well I used to anyway. Definitely not sewage, I’m thinking of a nice smell.

Show quote history

Yeah, I used to live near a sewage treatment plant and when the wind blew in a certain direction you could smell it... the "seaside smell" of my childhood was definitely not that! It was lovely.

Original poster
SharkBaitOooHaha · 04/07/2025 20:07

wastingtimeonhere · 04/07/2025 19:28

Are you sure you smelt salt? When we were kids we lived inland, only went to the beach once a year..as we approached, we would wind down the windows to see who could smell it first...I was..ahem..a lot older than I should have been before I realised the smell was sewage! 🙈🤣

I think it was more likely seaweed, the air near the sea is salty though.. You can taste it, well I used to anyway. Definitely not sewage, I’m thinking of a nice smell.

OP posts:
PorridgeAndSyrup · 04/07/2025 19:46

Thanks for asking this, OP, and for all the responses. I've been wondering the exact same thing for a few years now!

wastingtimeonhere · 04/07/2025 19:31

@Mayflyoff@Hobbes8 😆 snap..

wastingtimeonhere · 04/07/2025 19:28

Are you sure you smelt salt? When we were kids we lived inland, only went to the beach once a year..as we approached, we would wind down the windows to see who could smell it first...I was..ahem..a lot older than I should have been before I realised the smell was sewage! 🙈🤣

Bridport · 04/07/2025 18:36

I love that salty, ozone, seaweed smell especially on stormy days.

Virgin Vie used to do a seasidy range that totally captured it.

Mayflyoff · 04/07/2025 18:03

Hobbes8 · 03/07/2025 19:06

That wasn’t salt you could smell…it was sewage. Stand downwind of a sewage plant and you’ll get a rush of 80s beach holiday nostalgia.

Dont worry though! It’s coming back now water companies can dump shit with impunity.

Yes, this. It's revolting.

Dappy777 · 04/07/2025 17:57

Don't know if it's related, but someone on the news said the seas around Europe are far warmer than they'd normally be this time of year – especially the Mediterranean. I think the seas generally are warmer. Would that affect salt levels? They also said Europe is heating twice as fast as every other continent. Apparently, Spain, Italy and Greece are especially vulnerable. God knows what the future will bring. The way this person was talking, parts of southern Italy and Spain could soon be uninhabitable in June and July.

Cheeseplantandcrackers · 04/07/2025 17:35

I’ve always lived right by the sea and can smell it now just as strongly as I could when I was a child.

Original poster
SharkBaitOooHaha · 04/07/2025 17:32

JohnTheRevelator · 04/07/2025 17:15

This is what I was going to say. By the way,I absolutely LOVE Camber Sands,so many happy memories of the place.

Show quote history

It’s a beautiful beach, you should try and go over the summer.. I had a lovely day there recently.

OP posts:
JohnTheRevelator · 04/07/2025 17:15

FuzzyPuffling · 03/07/2025 18:17

Your sense of smell reduces with age.

This is what I was going to say. By the way,I absolutely LOVE Camber Sands,so many happy memories of the place.

Namechangedforspooky · 04/07/2025 17:13

Have you had Covid? That may well have altered your sense of smell permanently

noctilucentcloud · 04/07/2025 17:11

"Actually studies show that the salinity of the sea has increased across the majority of places since the 80’s."

It depends where you are. In general, the sea surface has got saltier in the subtropics, and less salty near the equator, at the UK latitudes and also in the Southern Ocean. The Atlantic overall has probably become more salty.

DPotter · 04/07/2025 16:31

You were smelling the seaweed, not the salt.

Hoardasurass · 04/07/2025 15:56

Valeriekat · 04/07/2025 02:17

Did you just make this up?

Show quote history

No there's been quite a few scientific articles about it if you spend 5 minutes on Google you'll find loads some by crancks and some by reputable scientists which has been peer reviewed

Valeriekat · 04/07/2025 02:17

Hoardasurass · 03/07/2025 18:24

Due to the melting of the polar ice and glacial melt water diluting the salt to water ratio it is becoming less salty which is what's messing with the gulf stream and if it continues it could shut it down completely and that would cause the UK to get much colder.
What you're noticing is climate change in action

Did you just make this up?

Devonshiregal · 04/07/2025 00:35

Some beaches smell salty. Not seaweed. That’s a different smell. And yes I do know what you mean op, I have had similar thoughts but put it down to childhood memory nostalgia making the memory stronger iyswim.

EmeraldRoulette · 04/07/2025 00:23

Oh dear

no more
"salt air and the rust on your door"

"dislodged seaweed after a high tide .. and the rust on your door" does NOT work 😂

@SharkBaitOooHaha I know what you mean about the salt smell. And so does Taylor!

KrisAkabusi · 04/07/2025 00:01

SharkBaitOooHaha · 03/07/2025 19:36

Fair enough, must be the seaweed that I’m noticing and not the sea. Thanks for all of the responses that weren’t sarcastic and condescending for no reason whatsoever.

Two posters made jokes. Everybody else gave a sensible explanation as to why you think what you do. Nobody was being sarcastic or condescending.

neverknowinglyunreasonable · 03/07/2025 20:05

In your childhood memory were you also eating crisps?

nellly · 03/07/2025 20:03

AngelsWithSilverWings · 03/07/2025 18:56

I live by the sea. For us it's seaweed we can smell. At low tide we get the smell wafting up from the seafront.

I was thinking this as a fellow coast dweller, I know the smell OP means and I don’t think it’s the salt it’s the dislodged seaweed after a high tide

Original poster
SharkBaitOooHaha · 03/07/2025 19:36

Fair enough, must be the seaweed that I’m noticing and not the sea. Thanks for all of the responses that weren’t sarcastic and condescending for no reason whatsoever.

OP posts:
ElCorazon · 03/07/2025 19:10

Sea smells fishy, not like salt. Salt is odourless, so what are you even talking about?

thenightsky · 03/07/2025 19:09

My grandparents used to say it was the smell of ozone.

NeverDropYourMooncup · 03/07/2025 19:07

It was rotten seaweed you could smell - mostly bladderwrack.