Residents in Dudley are being reminded to make the most of their recycling collections this Christmas.

Christmas is a time for feasting and gift giving, wonderful activities which have the side effect of generating lots more waste.

Fortunately, much of this can be recycled. Gifts, including bottles of wine, tins of biscuits, chocolate boxes, mince pie cases and most Christmas cards and non-foil wrapping paper can all be recycled.

Dudley Council collects glass, metal, paper, card and most plastics as part of its fortnightly recycling collection.

As well as the standard glass bottles, glass jars and jar lids, drinks cans, food cans, plastic drink, milk, detergent and toiletry bottles, newspaper and cardboard, aerosols, yoghurt pots, margarine tubs, food trays and food punnets, residents are asked to think about what else they can recycle from their Christmas festivities.

This includes clean aluminium foil and foil trays, plastic chocolate tubs, chocolate boxes, squirty cream aerosols, Christmas cards (without glitter), envelopes, cardboard boxes and packaging minus any excess tape, non-foil wrapping paper as long as it passes the scrunch test (scrunch it up and if it doesn’t bounce back it’s paper and safe to recycle).

The council does not collect juice cartons, black trays, plastic film, plastic bags or any other plastic items such as toys.

Residents are reminded to rinse out items first and squash plastics and cans where they can, to take up less space. It’s important not to put dirty or non-recyclable items out for collection as they can contaminate an entire load.

Contaminated recycling costs over £100 per tonne and can cause the entire load to be rejected by our processors. Councillor Damian Corfield, cabinet member for highways and environmental services, said:

“Christmas is a time when people come together to share gifts and food. And while this brings much joy, it can also create a lot of waste which is why it’s so important to recycle where you can.

“We collect a really wide range of materials for recycling, and we’d just like to remind people to really think about what should go in their recycling rather than just throwing things into their general waste.”

Please make sure your recycling is clean. Cardboard boxes need to be folded/broken up, kept as dry as possible and put into the blue bag.  Cardboard/boxes left to the side may not be collected

Real trees and wreaths, textiles and cartons can be recycled at the Household Waste Recycling Centre at Stourbridge.  Appointments can be booked online.

There will be some changes to waste and recycling collections over the Christmas and New Year period.

All collections are moving back a day with the exception of the collection due on Monday 25 December which will be brought forward to Saturday 23 December.

The list of date changes is as follows:

Residents are reminded to put their black wheelie bins, black box and blue and green recycling bags out as normal for collections from 6am onwards.

Full details can also be found on the ‘bins and recycling’ pages of the council website.