More than 600 volunteers helped beautify 12 parks and other locations on Saturday during the annual Truckee River Clean-Up event.

Put on by the community organization Keep Truckee Meadows Beautiful, volunteers picked up litter, cleared dead brush, pulled weeds, spread mulch and performed other maintenance tasks at places like Rock Park in Sparks.

For the seventh year, outdoor adventure retailer REI organized the efforts at Rock Park. Dave Hess, outreach specialist for REI, said in the five years he has been working this event he has seen some interesting trash pulled from the river, including shopping carts and a parking meter. This year he said there were 120 volunteers at Rock Park, including a number of groups from Reed High School, the University of Nevada, Reno, the Boy Scouts and Girls Scouts.

Hess said on Saturday after the clean-up he expected to find more possessions from homeless persons but most of the mess has been trash. Rock Park volunteers were also transplanting cottonwood trees, he added.

“Keep Truckee Meadows Beautiful is fighting keep Truckee Meadows ugly,” Hess said. “I think we’re winning today.”

Among the Rock Park volunteers on Saturday was Girl Scout Troop 220 from Reno. The dozen or so youngsters and their adult leaders were doing one of their community service projects by walking along the trail west of the main park picking up anything they found that belonged in a trash can: cigarette butts, shoes, socks, straws, etc.

When asked what they thought of people who litter, the gaggle of Girl Scouts collectively said, “Bad!”

“We want to keep the environment clean,” third-grader Jaeden Choate, 8, said as she bounded down the trail that runs parallel to the river.

For information about Keep Truckee Meadows Beautiful and tips on keeping your community clean, go to www.ktmb.org.