Meet Bitey, the life-size zombie shark that wants to chomp into your can collection

No, you're not imagining it there's a life-sized zombie shark hanging out around Highbury and Oxford, and it turns out he's there for a good cause.

'Bitey' is the lawn mascot for one family's campaign to feed hungry Londoners this October.

Sarah Appleby and her husband, Tom, built the 25-foot-long shark with their kids and they're using their home-made monster to collect food donations for the London Food Bank.

"My heart goes out to people who are struggling with food costs rising and things being hard with work," said Appleby. "With the foot traffic we've had in previous years, I'd be silly to turn down this kind of opportunity."

Bitey is the third installment in a series of hair-raising lawnscapes that the family has designed and built around Halloween.

Last year, the Applebys who own a trim carpentry company built a giant spider that they say easily drew more than 1,000 people over the course of the month. The year before, it was an alien crash site.

"We like the idea of scale, because it really gets people's attention, so we thought if we're going to do something, we're going to go big," said Appleby.

They built the shark made of plywood, MDF paneling and a 2 x 6 board to match the average size of a female Great White.

It's taken them almost a month to build it and around Halloween, they'll be adding fog, bubbles, sound effects and thermal vents to Bitey's grassy pond.

That comes as Canadians grapple with record inflation and a tough-as-nails housing market, not to mention an economy that's only just starting to recover from the COVID-19 pandemic.

Co-Executive Director of the London Food Bank Jane Roy says the tailing off of COVID-19 government supports like the Canada Recovery Benefit (CRB) is bringing more peopleinto for help for the first time, or for some the first time in a while.

"Food prices are going up, rent is going up, everything is kind of going up," she said. "It's just really, really difficult out there."

Londoners who want to pay Bitey a visit can go to 65 Wethered Street.

The Applebys say they're accepting food drop-offs on weekdays after 4 p.m. and anytime on weekends until Nov. 1 when they plan to drive their haul to the London Food Bank.