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My boyfriend was a little unhappy about it but last week I signed up to an online dating site. Planet Earth Singles is a website for "ecosexuals", people who are only interested in relationships with other environmentally-minded people.

Online, people with the most questionable fetishes have been catered for since way back in the early-Nineties.

The poor, single environmentalist, however, has been left struggling to find anyone other than Gaia to love.

But now ecosexualism is on the rise and all over the internet websites such as vegetarianpassions.com, vegan passions.com and ethicalsingles.com are appearing, all filled with singles looking for their ethical equal.

Carli Macdonald runs a fair-trade children's clothing company in Saltdean. She says: "I couldn't go on a mainstream dating site because a lot of these guys have no idea what I am about. To them it's all football and beer.

I'm on a Pagan dating site, I've been through lots of them - vegetarian and vegan dating, too. It's a very viable way of meeting people, especially if you work freelance."

While it may be true like attracts like, having such specific requirements can also make things quite complicated.

Never mind finding someone who likes to recycle as much as you do, just filling in the forms is a mind-bending activity.

Most dating sites will cover the basics: age (29), eye colour (brown), star sign (Leo), specific sexual proclivity (waste management), but Planet Earth Singles goes a step further in asking for my astrological rising sign (err..), Ayurvedic body type (8 inches?) and my dietary preference (can I admit I eat meat?).

There are then different groups for people with extraordinarily specific interests - for people who travel the world, hopefully not by plane; for those interested in aura transformations or miracles; and even a group called 2012, for people awaiting the huge global shift predicted by the Mayan calendar that year. (Incidentally, ask a genuine Mayan about that and they will have no idea what you are talking about.) But even after such a gruelling interrogation, there is no guarantee of finding your perfect love match.

Carli met her last partner on a Pagan website and even though they lived together for a year, she soon realised their vast lifestyle differences meant the relationship could not continue.

She says: "There were huge political and environmental differences. He was very right wing and thought being into the environment was a trend.

There was also a big spiritual divide, he was a staunch Catholic and I am a white witch.

"I met him on a Pagan dating site but he thought Pagan meant hippie - he actually asked me if I sacrificed anything. He was just a long-haired guy looking for an alternative-looking girl but it's more than just visual for me: it is lifestyle. It was quite disastrous in the end."

And even with the millions of people on the net, the dating pool does not necessarily get that much bigger.

Carli says: "I've contacted a friend of mine in Brighton who was on the website and I keep bumping into exboyfriends."

Outside of cyberspace, however, ecosexualism is just as popular.

Kelly King, a Brighton-based writer ,says: "I find nothing more off-putting than an apathetic bloke. I used to fancy a guy I worked with, but he never recycled, said he didn't care about the environment and used that really annoying argument about the Earth having already had 80 ice ages and it all being part of the planet's natural process. I quickly found him physically repulsive."

A canvas bag full of other Brighton and Hovites are proud to wear the ecosexual tag: animal rights activist Sue Baumgardt, political cartoonist James Parsons, author Mike Powell, PR consultant Caroline Puttock and Emma Boulting, activist and mother of former climate change champion and The Argus eco-diarist Jordan Stephens.

James says: "It can make it harder to find someone but, on the other hand, I only wear second-hand clothes and don't wear deodorant because I refuse to contribute to the fashion industry so, basically, any woman whose values I can't stand probably wouldn't come near me with a bargepole anyway."

One day after registering on Planet Earth Singles, four people have viewed my profile and I feel a little embarrassed about my rambling profile entry, something about building an Earthship with low shelves or finding a tall man to reach things for me.

Regardless, I receive an email from a man called Squill, a vegetarian Virgo who also doesn't know his rising sign or his Ayurvedic body type either. It is almost a perfect match, until I see he lives in Australia.

It's not so much the distance, more the fact he would consider getting on a plane that's the problem.

Are ecological concernes important in your choice of date?

11:08am Monday 11th February 2008

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