Beer cans, beer bottles and bothersome waste.
These are just a few things collected and taken to the dump each month on campus, along with an average of 406 tons of trash.
According to Leigh Jacobson, assistant coordinator of the Recycling and Solid Waste Program, that's 812,000 pounds of waste to pick up.
But who picks up the trash?
"We're not just yard boys," said Melissa Newton, landscape services supervisor at the University. "We do a lot more than cut grass. We're the only department that cleans the outside."
Landscape services and waste management work together to help beautify Auburn's campus.
Newton has been working for Auburn for 22 and a half years and said her team really cares about what they do for the campus.
Newton's landscape services team not only cleans the campus grounds, but also handles the outside of buildings and the landscape surrounding them.
Newton said of all the places on campus, the amphitheater and Wire Road are the dirtiest locations on game days. "It could take up to four
hours for four people to clean the amphitheater," Newton said.
Newton and her team pick up 42 tons of trash after each football game
That may be hard to believe, but Renaya Carter, administrative associate for landscape services and "co-captain" to Newton, said the ground is filled with everything you can think of, including old cheese wrappers, party trays, hotdogs, shrimp and toilet paper with surprises underneath.
"We've tried to put out trash bags," Newton said. "We put dumpsters. People just drop it. It's kind of like they think we're fairies who are going to clean it up."
Carter said they really do have to deal with some disgusting stuff.
"From pig heads to poop," Carter said. "Yes... a pig head, a for real one... on a stick."
The pig head was found after an Arkansas game about four years ago on Wire Road, Newton said
With situations like these, clean up can become overwhelming.
"They don't understand," Carter said. "When they come here and they party and they drink and they have a wonderful time and then they leave a disgusting mess, it's landscape services that's out front picking it up."
Newton said sometimes they don't even know where to start, but with her team of 22, they get the job done.
Messy or dirty as it seems, Newton said she enjoys her job, especially designing how the flower beds are going to look and picking out what plant materials are going to be used.
Newton said it's good to get dirty sometimes; however, some local bar employees disagree.
Tom Boardman, a bar-back who works at 1716 on Magnolia Avenue, said it stinks to clean up and it's even worse to clean up vomit.
Boardman's job is to clean and wash everything in the bar, even the less appealing things.
Boardman said he's been doing it for so long now that he's gotten use to the throw-up part.
"You just got to get in there and do it," Boardman said.
His advice for those in the bar scene is to go to the bathroom and throw-up, because it's better than throwing up in the middle of the bar.
Both on campus or off there are people fighting the battle against bothersome waste for everyone. And they're cleaning it up, one pig head at a time.
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