The wind picks up discarded plastic bags and deposits them in trees, where the unsightly tattered remains remain for years.

So, on the model of the groups that clear tropical beaches and reefs of plastic netting, I propose we arm small teams of bag snatchers, with twenty or thirty foot long versions of the devices stores use to reach objects on high shelves. Then we let them roam the streets, or fields, clearing trees of the plastic bags caught in their branches.

In urban areas, we can simply add these tools to the pruning devices used by the tree maintenance crews. Elsewhere, we can draw on the ranks of people who are normally inclined to pick up other people's litter, just to make the world a better place.