The LRWP and SEWA volunteers went out to the litter trap in the Green Brook on Saturday, August 9th, 2025, to conduct a litter tally. Huge thanks to our SEWA International Central Jersey youth partners! Thanks to their efforts, we’ll have much better data on how the litter trap keeps our watershed clean. Learn more about the litter trap initiative here. And learn more about the LRWP’s litter tally project with SEWA here. Below, you’ll find Sewa’s Nilesh Bhat describing the litter we picked up and conditions surrounding the litter trap.

Blog post by Yashashvi Pabbisetty

After several weeks of cleaning up and observing the Greenbrook stream and the litter trap, we have finished our final cleanup. During this meeting we noticed a significant amount of litter built up inside the trap as well as outside in the stream, met with two board members of the Lower Raritan Watershed Partnership, and ended the meeting by testing how various different pieces of litter go through the trap.

Trash Inside the Litter Trap:

• 4 plastic bottles
• 2 aluminum cans
• 1 glass bottle
• 1 paper wrapper
• 6 shot bottles 
• 1 foam rocket
• 15-20 pieces of styrofoam
• 1 piece of cardboard 
• 4 cigarette butts

Trash Outside the Litter Trap

• 1 broken down mattress
• 18 broken glass pieces
• 5 ceramic pieces
• 3 glass bottles
• 16 plastic bottles
• 8 aluminum cans 
• 17 plastic wrappers
• 1 metal rod 
• 2 tires
• 1 styrofoam food container
• 2 shot bottles
• 1 piece of fabric
• 1 strap
• 1 purse
• 1 toolbox piece with nails
• 26 plastic bags
• 1 umbrella
• 5 styrofoam pieces
• 1 piece of paper

During this meeting we had the opportunity to present to two members of the LRWP board, Nandini Checko and Anton Getz. First, we presented our findings from our group report on the storm which took place on July 14th, and then we discussed what we’ve learned about the litter trap. Afterwards, Dini and Anton shared their professional experiences with us, as well as their path to careers in environmental activism, safety, and science.

After our discussion, we collected and counted the litter. Anton helpfully brought a metal canoe to move swiftly through the stream, and collect tires and large objects; his canoe allowed him to float heavy debris up and down the stream.

Our meeting with Nandini and Anton gave us insights into the importance of the work that we do each week, how it fits into the bigger picture, and the ways in which volunteer organizations fill important gaps in the fight against plastic pollution.

To finish off our final meeting, we decided to each pick an item from the day’s cleanup to put back in the stream behind the litter trap and had a race; whichever item went into the trap first, would be victorious. This final experience answered a question that was on many of our minds: what item moves through the stream the fastest. The item which ended up winning was a piece of a styrofoam tray. This collaboration between the Sewa central jersey chapter volunteer organization and LRWP turned out as a huge success; we have gained accurate data about the trash flows in the Green Brook, and learned a tremendous amount about riparian floodways, environmental activism, plastic pollution, and community engagement!