Volunteers collected one tonne of litter across Ireland’s beaches and waterways on Sunday during the second annual Big Weigh In. Some of this year’s stranger finds included an adult toy, a car bumper and a live mouse. The field mouse, found trapped alive inside a plastic bag, was freed and scampered away.
The co-ordinated clean-up is the brainchild of Flossie and the Beach Cleaners, a marine environmental charity that clears Ireland’s beaches of rubbish. During the same two-hour period, volunteers from across Ireland collect litter and see who has amassed the most litter and other waste by weight.
More than 440 volunteers from the Republic’s 26 counties participated in this year’s event. After tallying the amount of rubbish collected, the organisers were thrilled to discover that, despite having more volunteers, this year’s one accumulated total was far less than last year’s four tonnes.
The hope expressed was that the reason might be more people using bins in public places or bringing their litter home with them.
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Groups who had signed up to host a clean-up received a Flossie pack which included bags, a beanie hat and scales to weigh the collected rubbish. The beanie hat, emblazoned with the organisation’s logo, is awarded to the person in each group who finds the oddest item.
Harriet Donnelly, founder of Flossie and the Beach Cleaners and also Flossie’s mom, said: “It used to be that whoever found the first pair of men’s pants was given the beanie. But now, everyone finds men’s pants.”
At Kilcoole in Co Wicklow volunteers collected 20kg of dog poo while a Galway clean-up crew came across numerous gunshot cartridges which Ms Donnelly thinks crews of fishing vessels used to shoot seals and marine birds that attacked their nets.
Flossie Donnelly (15) oversaw the clean-up at Sandycove beach and explained how the idea came to fruition. “We’ve always loved the idea of doing a beach clean where we clean at the same time as someone in a different country. And then we thought we could do the same in Ireland where the entire country works together to collect rubbish and see at the end how much we can all together collect.”
Many who attended the clean-up at Sandycove expressed concern about the environment and the ocean.
Louise Acton, a committee member of Save Our Seafront, travels from Killiney to Sandycove to swim. “It’s an amazing facility for us and we are so lucky. It’s the simplest thing in the world to put your rubbish in a plastic bag and bring it home,” said Ms Acton. “Flossie is a big supporter of us, so we wanted to support her.”
Niamh Morris and her husband, David Taylor, of Glenageary, are also members of Save Our Seafront described Flossie as “a local hero”.
“She and our support especially on a day like this where it’s a national event,” Ms Morris said. “If the local people don’t support it, then you can’t expect to make change.”
Although the Big Weigh In is limited to counties in Ireland, a Canadian Instagrammar and a clean-up group in Spain reached out to Flossie and the Beach Cleaners, expressing a desire to participate. Help to remove litter is always welcome, but Ms Donnelly confirmed that the detritus collected abroad did not contribute to Ireland’s weight total.