Every July 5, Keep Lee County Beautiful organizes an annual beach cleanup because of the amount of trash left behind over the Independence Day holiday. Fireworks, bottles, cans, and more litter the beaches. So in order to keep the trash out of the waterways, Keep Lee County Beautiful organizes this initiative every year.

The Bailey-Matthews National Shell Museum staff joined the cleanup this year as two museum marine biologists were site leads for the Sanibel Causeway Islands. "The museum is glad to support Keep Lee County Beautiful’s efforts to help preserve our environment and protect our local marine life," Executive Director Sam Ankerson said. The 13 volunteers collected 18 bags of trash along a 1.5-mile stretch of shoreline, which equaled about 200 pounds of debris.