Museum of Litter

Litter Donations from July 4, 2010, Lauderdale by the Sea, FL beach

Here are pictures of the litter left behind from the 4th of July festivities.

Make a free digital scrapbooking design

It was rainy all afternoon and evening of the 4th, with intermittent scattered thunder storms, so there were not a lot of beach-goers for sun or fireworks. I picked up only four bags worth of litter this morning from behind Aruba, Anglin's Pier, Oriana and south to the Datura Portal.

Lauderdale by the Sea has a contract with a beach raker that combs the beach and picks up most of the debris. However, the equipment doesn't go to the water's edge and they are not set up to separate the recyclables. So, I concentrate on picking up litter at the shoreline (to prevent it from joining the Atlantic Garbage Patch); the recyclables and broken glass. I leave the rest for the raker; especially the fireworks, some of which did not detonate.

Of the four bags worth of litter I gathered, one bag was trash, two bags were recyclables and the fourth bag was my 'pick of the litter' to add to the Museum of Litter's collections.

Sunrise Litter pickup May 23, 2010, at beach in LBTS, FL

 

This morning I was happy to meet Scott, Jill and Zoey Zigler who were out  picking up litter at sunrise on the beach just south of Anglin's Pier. Nice family. Between the Zigler family and me we had picked up 11 bags of litter (on this relatively clean beach), that fortunately will never make it to the Atlantic Garbage  Patch. You can see there are lots of plastic water bottles. Luckily, Lauderdale by the Sea, which is fast becoming known as ECO, has recycling containers at most of the beach portals. So, everything that could be recycled was recycled. Thank you Scott, Jill and Zoey for making a difference!

It's the Little Things that Count

You've heard that a thousand times. It's just as true with litter.

Here in Lauderdale by the Sea, FL people say, "We have a clean beach." And basically, we do. If you look up and down the beach usually you'll see just natural, pristine, beauty. However, if you look close, especially at the tidelines in the seaweed, you'll see a lot of small bits of (mostly) plastic...bottle caps, lighters, straws, fast-food drinking cups... the list goes on & on. These things are almost invisible when you glance down the beach. Yet, that is the very thing that makes them so deadly -- that they are so small. Small enough to look like food. Small enough for your fine feathered & finned friends to eat and feed their young and then die because they can't digest our detritus.

Until litter prevention is the norm, if you'd like to help, consider taking a plastic bag with you and spending a few minutes picking up litter you encounter in your daily travels.

 

3 Monkeys, Cocoa Beach, FL now carrying Museum of Litter art

 

Our art is now in an adorable, eclectic, gift shop in Cocoa Beach, FL called 3 Monkeys. The owner, Lisa, has added our unique upcycled, recycled litter art to her fabulous selection of gifts. One of the pieces she selected is actually made from Cocoa Beach litter -- cigarette butts and bottle caps collected from the parking lot of Cocoa Beach Pier. If you're in the area, stop by, say hi and check it out. 3 Monkeys is at 24 North Orlando Ave. close to the landmark Coconuts, near A1A and Minutemen Causeway. www.3Monkeys.us

Litter Donations -- July 19, 2009 -- Lauderdale by the Sea, FL

This is the litter collected along the shoreline this morning. I started behind Windjammer at the Datura Portal, and headed north, ending just north of Anglin's Pier where the trash and recycling containers are located behind Aruba.  The bag on the right is litter that was able to be recycled.

As I walked back south I picked up more litter. The stuff in the bag on the left I considered 'keepers.' I took it home, washed it, put it in the sun to dry and will upcycle it by making art from it.

Litter Donations -- July 15, 2009 -- Lauderdale by the Sea, FL

So much litter.... so little time. Had to get to work early, so did more documenting than picking up.

This photograph is of litter just south of Anglin's Pier --  lots of plastic bottles, glass beer bottles, styrofoam, a pizza box. If you look near the shadow of the pier you'll see lots of specks -- it's all litter. Was surprised to see so much litter on a Wednesday morning. Picked up about a half grocery bag full of litter walking along the shore from the pier south to the next portal at Datura Ave. Was able to rescue a few plastic water bottles from going out to sea to be recycled instead.

Litter Donations -- July 8, 2009 -- Lauderdale by the Sea, FL

At sunrise picked up 4 bags within an hour.

Starting at 6:30 am, walked north from Windjammer, to Anglin's Pier and ended behind Aruba Beach Cafe where there are both garbage and recycling containers. I concentrated on picking up along shoreline, but if I saw plastic bottles or cans in the dry sand, I picked those up. By the time I reached the recycling containers behind Aruba I had collected 3 full bags. The 2 bags on the left are recycling and other bag is miscellaneous litter, including, my personal 'favorite' -- a dirty diaper!

On the way back south I collected one more bag. The fourth bag included some recycling that had to be thrown away as there are no recycling containers at the entrance/exit to beach just south of the pier.

 Litter Donations -- July 5, 2009 -- Lauderdale by the Sea, FL

Picked up litter this morning along the beach from behind Windjammer north to Anglin's Pier. I picked up from 7:00 to 8:20. There was litter strewn everywhere from all the people who came to watch our town's Fourth of July fireworks display at the beach last night.

There is NO excuse for all this littering. There are garbage containers at every portal to the beach, AND, there are now recycling containers at most of the portals.  I'd say a good half of the litter picked up this morning was bottles and cans than can be recycled. I picked up one large garbage bag of trash and 5+ full grocery bags full of recycling.

Unfortunately not all the bottles and cans got recycled. The crew that picks up garbage was busy loading the trash from the waste cans into their truck. I set all my bags down in front of the recycling containers, which is about ten feet away from the waste cans they were working. They don't pick up the recycling. Someone else does that or they do it at a different time, I really don't know. Anyway, I walked about 50 feet away to take a picture of another trash container overflowing with garbage before the crew got to that can. (I wanted  a picture for reference as I think not having enough cans, especially for holiday events, leads to additional litter). As I turned to walk back to my bags of recycling, one of the crew was dumping my bag of recycling into the trash containers in the bed of his truck. I'm sure he thought he was doing something helpful -- he'd gone out of his way to walk over to the recycle container to get these bags. I was alarmed. I had not yet taken a photo to document the amount of litter and recycling collected and ran over to him and cried, "No! That's mine. I need to photograph it. It needs to go in the recycling." I asked for the bag back that he had just thrown in, but he said no and continued to dump the second bag, saying, "they're just bottles." I told him they are recycling, not just bottles, not garbage, but he kept repeating they're just bottles.  He had picked up three of my five bags of recycling. I was able to retrieve one. He didn't seem to get the point about recycling and I'm sure he just thought I was a crazy person wanting the bottles. So in the picture, only three of the five brown bags of recycling are shown or were able to be recycled.

I didn't pick up any of the fireworks. In years past I have, but I've decided it just may not be smart to handle them so I left that (and one dirty diaper) for the Beach Raker.

Picked up one more bag heading south from the pier. There was some recycling in that bag also that had to be thrown away. Unfortunately, just south of the pier is one of the few locations where there is no recycling container at the beach entrance/exit .

  Litter Donations -- June 17, 2009 -- Lauderdale by the Sea, FL

Picked up three and a half bags of litter this morning in a half hour from 8:00 - 8:30 am. (Third full bag not shown.) This was picked up from behind Windjammer heading north to just north of Anglin's pier behind Aruba. The brown bag (1/2 bag) was filled with things I took home, washed, sanitized and will make art from, or add to the museum's collection. Of the two white bags, the one on the right was throw-away trash and the one on the left is full of plastic & glass bottles and aluminum cans that were recycled in this recycle bin.

I think a lot more people would recycle their beach waste if the recycle signs were on both sides of the receptacle. Here is a picture of the same bins from the other side. You only see the signs when you enter the beach, not when you are leaving the beach with your trash. This morning I saw a young  kid walk from the shore with an aluminum can and throw it into the garbage. He probably didn't realize there was recycling.  If we could just duplicate the signs so they are on BOTH sides, we would make a lot of progress in our recycling efforts.

Litter Donations -- June 11, 2009 -- Lauderdale by the Sea, FL

The beach was a MESS this morning. Litter everywhere. Pizza boxes, all kinds of soda, water, beer bottles.

Had an early appointment so not a lot of time to pick up this morning. I knew the Beach Raker would get this, so I just took a picture and moved on to picking up the small bits of plastic debris along the shore it can't get. (Picture below)

 The Beach Rakers are doing a great job. Have noticed them getting out of their machine and picking up large amounts of litter by hand, which is a good thing because the beer bottles and cans just get crushed by their machines and are more dangerous than if they had just been left littering the beach.  Do they recycle these bottles and cans?

In one half hour, (from 7:50 am to 8:20 am) collected one full bag of litter. Walked from Anglin's Pier, south, past the Datura Portal, and finished behind the Windjammer. 

THANK YOU to the Town of Lauderdale by the Sea for the new recycling containers. I used the one at Datura Portal and could see another one at the Hibiscus Portal. Are they at every portal? Hope so. A great addition to helping our town be green.