Litter pick at Styal on Sunday 1st March 2026

Eight of us met Ranger Stuart in the car park then piled into two cars to follow him onto the airport perimeter road. The Styal Estate virtually backs on to the airport fence and there’s a raised bank that’s a popular spot for plane spotters.

We spent the day walking the road and surrounding paths looking for rubbish.  Unfortunately, it wasn’t difficult to find but not necessarily easy to get to.  We found lots of things like cans and bottles that had been just thrown away due to laziness.

The articles of clothing we found included an M&S Autograph label jacket and a sweatshirt, T-shirt and socks.  Almost enough for a fashion parade!

We had a very British lunch break sitting between the cars, but at least the ice cream van arrived.

We collected about 35 bags of litter.  Fortunately the job of sorting the rubbish for recycling belongs to Suez.

One of the plane spotters we spoke to live streams aircraft take offs.  After we told him we were NT volunteers who should have been planting trees, he promised to organise his Facebook followers to do some additional litter picking.

This was a satisfying day.  Annoying because the job should not be necessary, but satisfying because the results were so visible - or invisible!

Jean