Break out the boots and sunscreen, or maybe the rain gear. It’s time to hike the beaches again for SOLV’s Great Oregon Fall Beach Cleanup.

The event will be from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. on Saturday, Sept. 20. Thousands of volunteers are needed to participate at 44 sites along the Oregon Coast. Volunteering is easy: Just check in at any of the cleanup sites, pick up a litter bag, and head down to the beach to help spruce up the coast for wildlife and visitors.

“Marine debris takes a heavy toll on the environment, wildlife and even the local economy,” said Pamela Sery, SOLV’s beach cleanup coordinator.  “We hope everyone who enjoys the beach’s splendor takes their environmental duty seriously and joins us in this great event.”

SOLV suggests volunteers bring gloves, dress for the weather, wear sturdy shoes, and watch their surroundings while picking up litter.

Since beginning the program in 1984, SOLV has worked to collect more than 1,000 tons of trash with the help of nearly 175,000 volunteers, a SOLV press release said. Locally in 2007, 400 volunteers in Douglas, Coos and Curry counties collected about 10,000 pounds of trash.

Cigarette butts and plastic bottles are the most common trash picked up, but some odd items have been found on South Coast beaches in recent cleanups, Sery said. Among the more unusual were a couch and a water heater. At Umpqua Dunes last year, someone found one high-heeled shoe.

“I don’t know where the other one is,” Sery said. “It could be in Japan by now.”

Plastic bottles don’t have quite the same aura of mystery, but the number collected is increasing. Sery said in the last cleanup the number doubled in the Brookings area. Such trends are spurring SOLV to spread the word that it is up to Oregonians to keep their beaches clean.

In the 2007 fall event, about 4,000 volunteers collected 30 tons of trash up and down Oregon’s coast.

“That is about what we average every year,” Sery said. “The behavior hasn’t changed.”

Only about 20 percent of the trash found on the beach is washed up. The other 80 percent is left on the beach by the people who use it. This year, SOLV will encourage volunteers to fill out cards keeping track of what and how much is collected. That information will help determine not only the source of the garbage, but how people can prevent it from ending up on the beach.

SOLV would like to see less trash in the future. Sery hopes people put more effort into keeping beaches clean all year long and pick up after themselves while enjoying the sun and sand.

“We want to be part of the solution,” she said.