Living Off Beach Trash: April 2018

April was a tough month. I kept losing beach trash data, gave away most of my recyclables to the homeless and not to whine, but I had to give my hand-wrist a break. It was a month of trying to figure out how to make a living. ‘Beach Trash Sales’ do not seem to work effectively in my area. If the locals want towels and beach toys, they just have to go to the beach and pick them up themselves. The rentals of which is 50% of our hood (new data) don’t need or want clothes, when they can get them for free via craigslist or the Buy Nothing Facebook pages. That said, I have to come up with other viable ideas to produce income. 

But I still believe you can make a living or feed yourself by working the beach. One must be hungrier than I. One must hit all the trash cans and pull out the recycled products and uneaten food. (many still in unopened wrappers) One must be more productive in reusing or making products or art in order to sell. One must expand the territory to pick up more bottles in order to produce ready income. One must hunt and gather everyday in order to pay bills. One must stop giving away the recycling materials to the homeless. (That is not going to happen)

That said, my only income from recycling was… $16.10. No way can I live on this.

I lost data on 3 days and did not go out and pick up trash for 5 days. The total count for 22 days was 6210 pieces of litter or 283 pieces of beach trash a day. This month, I actually picked out recycles from the trash cans along the boardwalk. As much as I hate to do that as the pickers also do it, but they have to get there before the City Garbage trucks come and they are not up this early.

I forgot to post the beach trash count for the last week in April.

Essentially this is a low count, the weather hasn’t been that great, there have been several beach clean ups and the beach cleaners are out almost everyday at  4:30 am. Excuses, Excuses..