Waste warrior tidies foreshore

•   Tilly Johnston, Olive Howard, Gus Johnston and Annie Howard with some of the rubbish collected by the community in Bridport recently. Photo supplied.

By Daisy Baker,
Febryary 02, 2022

Bridport’s coastline is looking a little tidier thanks to three recent community clean-ups organised by eight-year-old Olive Howard.

Olive enjoys staying with grandparents in Bridport over the summer months and was prompted to take action after noticing lots of rubbish nearby.

“I was rock-climbing with Dad and a friend and we kept seeing lots of rubbish and I thought we should clean it up,” she said.

Parents Anita and Mick assisted by creating a Facebook group for her to spread the word and organise a series of litter collection days.

The first day in early January focussed on Gofton’s beach and surrounds, the following week they targeted Mermaids beach towards Granite Point and the final day they cleaned up between Old Pier beach and Mermaids.

Around 40 people joined in the effort over the three days, including locals, shack owners and even a few people who travelled from Launceston to help.

Bottles and cans, the odd boot and a few towels were among the items collected.

“When we went from Old Pier to Mermaids, we didn’t find as much rubbish as we expected to, which was good but at Mermaids we filled up five garbage bags,” Olive said.

The eight-year-old said rubbish that doesn’t make the bin can have a detrimental impact on the environment.

“If we don’t pick up rubbish, the wind can carry it to the sea and the sea creatures can eat it and die or birds could pick it up.”

Olive hopes to do more clean ups in Bridport in the future.

More details can be found at the Facebook group Olive’s Bridport Clean up.