Powys County Council has reminded residents of recycling tips ahead of Halloween.

The council has offered the following top tips ahead of October 31 to help residents think more sustainably.

The tips are:

• Make sure you scoop out the flesh of the pumpkins before carving and turn it into something delicious. There are plenty of ideas for some tasty treats on the Love Food Hate Waste website for you to choose from.

• Get creative with your costumes and buy second-hand, reuse old outfits, or make your own from old clothes, leftover bits of material or recycled rubbish.

• Use face paints to create your own scary faces, rather than buying plastic masks.

• Make your own spooky party decorations - paper bunting tied to string, coloured in pictures of spiders and skeletons, you could even try making your own paper-mâché pumpkins.

• Ditch the disposable partywear and instead use proper plates, glasses, and cutlery.

• Offer your trick or treaters some homemade treats such as pumpkin shaped biscuits – it makes a change from all the sweets and cuts out the plastic wrappers going to waste.

• Make sure to recycle as much of your Halloween waste as possible, especially if you have any leftover food, cans, plastic and glass bottles from parties.

• Although they can’t be recycled from home, most plastic wrapping, including sweet wrappers, can be recycled at collection points in your local supermarket. Just remember to bundle them all up and take them with you next time to go shopping.

• Once they’ve had their day, your old pumpkin shells can be added to your compost heap or cut up and popped into your food caddy. If they are really big (and not too rotten) they can be left on top of your kerbside food caddy for a one-off post-Halloween collection by our crews. Please remember to remove any candles first.

Cabinet Member for a Greener Powys, Cllr Jackie Charlton, said: “Most people in Powys are already doing a great job of making sustainable choices and recycling each week. But we can all do a little bit more, especially during these seasonal celebrations.

“Making an effort to be ‘greener’ is becoming easier with more and more of us choosing to reduce, reuse and recycle more than ever. The added bonus of these more environmentally friendly options is that they often save us money too.”

For more information on recycling, please visit the council’s website.