AN OKEHAMPTON woman has created her own unique protest against rubbish being thrown in the West Okement river in the town centre.

Jan Gilmour has knitted a fish into which she has woven plastic drinks can holders hauled out of the river – representing the scales.

She has hung her collage on the fence behind Waitrose, with the message ‘my river not your bin’.

‘That bit of river has got lovely trout in it and this morning when I went down there I saw a heron,’ she said.

‘I’m a busy grandmother, so I don’t have time to campaign but I really want to do my bit to try and look after it.’

Jan, a member of the Okement Rivers Improvement Group (ORIG), is a regular sight in her waders and swimming costume in the river.

She said she hauled out as many as 20 plastic drinks cans holders every month.

‘Other people do wild swimming, I do wild litter picking.

‘There will be bits that I miss of course, which will end up in the sea, but I do my best.

‘We have met a fisherman who has seen a fish trapped in one of these plastic rings and the fish had grown so the plastic was cutting into its body.

‘The rivers’ group is an improvement group. We didn’t start off as a litter picking group but the majority of us do feel this has become our main job,’ she added.

‘We continue to remove shopping trollies, plastic and cans from the rivers on a regular basis.’