Birta the Cat, who resides in the East Iceland fishing village of Höfn í Hornafirði, has made headlines for being a purrfectly wonderful member of her community. Vísir reports that the frisky feline is an avid trash picker and fills up to two garbage bags a month with trash she’s collected. She’s even been awarded a grant from Blái herinn, The Blue Army environmental association, for her efforts.
Birta spends her days collecting refuse, particularly from a local construction site. “She’s come back with a lot from there,” recalled Birta’s human, Stefanía Hilmarsdóttir. “Weather stripping, for example, four times, big bags. She’s come back from there with five, six-meter [16-19-ft] strips.”
Birta has also been found in pawsession of plastic bags and masks that she’s found in the area. She’s also particularly fond of lost garden gloves. Furtunately, not all of her finds are garbage. On New Year’s morning, she gifted her grateful human an unopened can of beer, which she’d lugged home in a plastic bag.
Birta’s avid environmental efforts have not gone unnoticed. This cat has dragged in so much garbage that Stefanía recently put on an exhibition of some of her most impressive finds at the Hornarfjörður Cultural Center. On top of that, Blái herinn, The Blue Army environmental association, recently awarded Birta a grant to allow for the purchase of a GPS tracker so that people can follow her on her productive prowls around town.
The pawsitive encouragement has been a real boost for Birta.
“She gets so proud when I see she’s got something,” said Stefanía. “Just bursting with it.”
You can follow Birta’s exploits on her Facebook page, here.
