You searched for: “scavenger
scavenger (s) (noun), scavengers (pl)
1. An animal or bird that feeds on dead animals (that it has not killed itself), or on dead plant material, or refuse: Vultures are just one example of the kind of scavengers that exist.
2. A person who searches for and collects discarded items of clothes, furniture, etc.: It isn't unusual to see a scavenger, or scavengers, going through dumpsters in cities looking for something that can be used.

There were several terms for scavengers in London during the 1800s including bone-pickers, rag-gatherers, pure-finders, dredger men, mud-larks, sewer-hunters, dustmen, night-soil men, bunters, toshers, and shoremen; all of which were recycling the junk or trash that they collected.

—Compiled from excerpts located in
The Ghost Map. The Story of London's Most Terrifying Epidemic and
How It Changed Science, Cities, and the Modern World

by Steven Johnson; Published by the Penguin Group; New York; 2006; page 1.
This entry is located in the following unit: English Words in Action, Group S (page 2)