Volunteers on paddleboards, kayaks, and canoes have cleared dozens of bags of rubbish from the River Severn in Shrewsbury.

About 30 took part and their haul included traffic cones, car tyres, plastic chairs and lots of fishing gear.

The clean up on Sunday was organised by Shrewsbury Vegans and their co-founder Chris Houlston said: “The paddleboards meant we could grab the rubbish that’s often inaccessible from the riverbank.”

He is a regular paddleboarder and said he saw “lots of rubbish” appearing in the river around the town centre.

The rubbish is then washed downstream and he said it was having “a really disastrous impact on the Severn, especially all the plastic”.

The day was arranged as part of Paddle UK’s nationwide Big Paddle Clean Up and the group said it planned to do another later in the year.

Andy Giddings
BBC News, West Midlands

BBC Shropshire