Nearly 100 volunteers gathered at Martin Place on Tuesday morning to begin clearing the sea of bouquets left in tribute to the victims of last week's siege at the Lindt Cafe.

In the lead up to 8am commuters looked on as boxes of varying sizes began lining the sea of the flowers in preparation for their removal.

There are about 95 bunches of flowers per square metre at Martin Place and one volunteer said he would not be surprised if there were up to 100,000 bouquets.

Approximately 40 Rural Fire Service volunteers, 40 State Emergency Services volunteers and 25 Red Cross volunteers were involved in the clearing of the flowers.