COTTON buds, crisp packets and bottle caps discarded by thoughtless people are blighting a Gourock beauty spot.

An army of over 50 volunteers spent Saturday morning clearing up Lunderston Bay and they recovered over 6,000 pieces of litter from the beach.

Organiser Kathleen McMillan, who is the local 'sea champion' for the Marine Conservation Society, says the volunteers were shocked to at the volume of litter they found.

It was an increase on the amount found during the previous beach clean back in September.

She said: "We had over 50 volunteers which was great, especially in January when the weather is not as nice.

"We removed over 6,000 bits of litter from the beach including 2,000 cotton buds, 600 bottle caps and 700 crisp and sweet packets.

"There was also fishing rope and fishing wire.

"We found more litter than we did at the September beach clean and I think that's due to the winter weather and the storms which have disturbed the sea bed and caused a lot of pollution to be washed up."

Kathleen, from Greenock, was recently named RSPB 'Young Nature Champion' at the Nature of Scotland awards, and she is urging people not to flush cotton buds down the toilet and is asking people to take home litter and recycle it.

She said: "Don't flush cotton buds down the toilet.

"Also if people are out and about, I would ask them to take their litter home and recycle it.

"I would also appeal to fishermen not to discard fishing rope and lines, it's dangerous to the marine life which could get tangled up in it.

"If anyone is down at Lunderston Bay and spots litter, it would be great if they pick it up."

The litter collected from the beach was recorded and the data has been sent to the Marine Conservation Society, who will pass it to the Scottish Government.