There are eight garbage cans in Pelican Town in the base version of Stardew Valley.

Quick Scoop: The Trashy Truth of Pelican Town

If you’re playing standard, unmodded Stardew Valley, Pelican Town has eight interactable garbage cans scattered around town. These are the ones you rummage through for items and for progress toward things like the Trash Catalogue.

Players and guides consistently list eight distinct locations in town, such as near the Stardrop Saloon, Mayor Lewis’s house, along Willow Lane, by the Blacksmith, and by JojaMart/Movie Theater. One gaming guide explicitly notes that “there are a total of eight in Pelican Town” when explaining how to search 50 cans for the Trash Catalogue unlock.

In other words, when someone asks “how many garbage cans are there in Pelican Town?” in the context of normal Stardew Valley, the accepted answer is: eight.

For modded setups like Stardew Valley Expanded, some forum discussions suggest higher numbers (for example, 20) depending on added areas and altered town layouts, but those refer to specific mod configurations rather than the vanilla game.

At the end of the day, if you’re talking vanilla Pelican Town , the garbage can count is locked in at eight—for now, that’s the “latest news” answer fans and guides converge on.

TL;DR: In vanilla Stardew Valley, Pelican Town has 8 garbage cans you can search.
[1][7] Information gathered from public forums or data available on the internet and portrayed here.