As the ice melts here in the UK, and we enter the first wombling-about of the litter-picking season, here’s a handy tip for cyclists who want to pick small amounts of litter while still seated. A standard litter-picking stick can be fitted to a bicycle with a £5 roll of the 12mm self-adhesive magnetic tape made by 3M. This can be easily had from eBay.

Aluminium bike frame and aluminium picker-stick? Neither are magnetic, but that’s no problem once you have the tape. Assuming you have a bike with a cross-bar, not a step-through, that is. Once there’s a 15 inch strip of the tape stuck to the side of the crossbar of the bike frame and also along the picker, and they’re able to firmly touch all the way, then they will firmly lock magnetically with a ‘snap’. The strength is sufficient for a standard 32″ Helping Hand stick not to fall off as you go over bumps. Yet the picker can also be easily separated by a simple ‘reach-down and upward pull’ while the rider is seated on the bike. And then easily re-clipped once the litter is bagged. The bag is hanging on one of the handlebars, or some people may have a pannier-basket.

Be sure to let the bike turn without the movement of the front brake-cables pulling the stick off the magnetic grip. Try sliding the stick’s handle / trigger-pull round the seat-post, and having the pincers sticking out just beyond the handle-bar post (but not far enough to entangle the brake-cables).

On days when the stick is not needed, the grey-black magnetic strip on the bike is not too conspicuous. Since it follows the lines of the bike and is only on one side. The alternative solution, for those just going long-distance to a litter-picking spot and then getting off the bike, is to fasten the stick in the same position — but to use velcro straps instead.

Obviously you don’t pick at busy times on a bicycle-path, since you might catch someone with the stick as they go past.

Not quite as cool as the Samurai litter pickers of Japan, but it’ll do for Stoke-on-Trent.