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Love Blue Inc. club members searching for trash at Bowditch Beach, Fort Myers, on Saturday, Sept. 27.
Shea Helton / WGCU
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A seahorse Love Blue Inc. member Tony Jimenez found in a tide pool at Bowditch Beach, Fort Myers, on Saturday, Sept. 27.
Shea Helton / WGCU
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Love Blue Inc. chapter at Florida Gulf Coast University helping to pick up trash and other litter along Southwest Florida beaches.
Shea Helton / WGCU
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Love Blue Inc. chapter at Florida Gulf Coast University helping to pick up trash and other litter at Bowditch Beach, Fort Myers, on Saturday, Sept. 27
Shea Helton / WGCU
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Isabella Venegas, left, and Domenic Bill, Love Blue Inc. chapter at Florida Gulf Coast University, pick up trash at Bowditch Beach, Fort Myers, on Saturday Sept. 27.
Shea Helton / WGCU
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Love Blue Inc. member Tony Jimenez saving a critter out of a tide pool at Bowditch Beach, Fort Myers, on Saturday, Sept. 27.
Shea Helton / WGCU
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Love Blue Inc. member Matthew Filliman picking up trash in a nature trail at Bowditch Beach, Fort Myers, on Saturday, Sept. 27
Shea Helton / WGCU
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Love Blue Inc. member Matthew Filliman’s trash bucket at Bowditch Beach, Fort Myers, on Saturday Sept. 27.
Shea Helton / WGCU
For the past three years, the Love Blue Inc. chapter at Florida Gulf Coast University has been a significant part of Lee County beach cleanup efforts.
Love Blue Inc. is a national nonprofit organization that focuses on ocean and shoreline conservation. The nonprofit includes school clubs and community chapters across the country.
Michaela Zimmerman, president of the local club, encourages students to come out to the beach cleanups to make a difference within the community.
Recently, the club hosted its third cleanup out of the nine that are planned for this semester. Forty pounds of trash were collected by 40 members.
According to the club’s Instagram account, in the spring 2025 semester, FGCU students turned up to various beaches and collected 2,138 pounds of trash total.
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