Rubbish Collection

The Friends organize a litter pick on the banks of most sections of the Waiwhetū and Awamutu streams on the first weekend of every month except January. The streams are divided into sections that generally take between 1 and 1½ hours to litter pick (although this does vary a bit, both up and down, depending on factors such as if there has been flooding or very high winds during the month).

We are always keen for more volunteers for the litter picking as many hands make light work! If you would like to help please contact us at friends.waiwhetu.stream@gmail.com.

 You can volunteer to be a regular litter picker for a section of the stream each month, or to be an "on call" litter picker whom we can call on occasionally for help when one of our regular litter pickers is unavailable to do their section. This is less of a commitment but is still extremely useful in keeping the streams free of litter in ensuring that each section is cleaned up every month. We assign regular litter pick volunteers a section of stream closest to their home (or another section of stream of their choice) and an orientation walk over of the relevant section of stream. Ongoing support is provided.

Rubbish bags are provided for volunteers to bag the litter collected along with rubbish pickers and latex gloves. Alternatively gardening gloves can be provided to volunteers who find these useful. Filled bags are left at designated collection points by the streams: these are usually the abutments of the road bridges over the streams. The Hutt City Council has contractors who then collect the bagged litter from the collection points for us.