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Leave No Trace pledge to pick up trash

It’s hard to know what’s purposely thrown out and what’s an accidental litter. Either way, it drives me bonkers seeing trash around. We do our best to grab trash on our walks, hikes, and paddles. But sometimes it’s hard to get it all

Here’s a photo of trash picked up everyday from some good friends of mine 1CC5E64E-742C-4350-8AF6-2D276F47DF72.jpeg
 
I bought a pack basket and utility pack for hauling others trash. It works well for reservoir shorelines. I line with a bag but the bag doesn’t come out when full. You have to dump it out to another bag. But it keeps the basket clean. For river banks though a contractor bag for small trash helps along with a longer canoe. Without cricket I can get barrels and tires in a 16’ and 17’ canoe.6A74977F-B68E-4BDA-A424-E4F874104994.jpeg
 
And every other park! Literally in sight off of the hiking trails
I was shocked the first time I went to Algonquin at the amount of trash there. The only clean place I found in the park was a loop I did that was deep in the NW corner of the park. I have never seen anything like it paddling in the ADK, Maine, or hiking in the Whites even in the '60s before the 'Leave no Trace movement.
 
I was shocked the first time I went to Algonquin at the amount of trash there. The only clean place I found in the park was a loop I did that was deep in the NW corner of the park. I have never seen anything like it paddling in the ADK, Maine, or hiking in the Whites even in the '60s before the 'Leave no Trace movement.
It’s beautiful that more and more people are getting out into nature and making purchases that help fund a park or brand. But what isn’t beautiful, is hiking in a scenic area only to see wads of willy roll and granola bar wrappers scattered. We learn things at an early age, be polite, don’t steal, don’t litter… where in life does the switch go off where we completely forget all of this? I’ve caught grown adults doing this, it’s not just punk kids
 
Growing up in the FL Keys we always packed out found trash, especially fishing line. As kids we used to go pick up cans, crush em, and sell by weight to a recycler. It took a lot of work to make $20! Dad worked for National Audubon for 31 years. I was also a Boy Scout and we routinely participated in cleanup projects. I pack out trash at any of our work sites, which has variously included car batteries and tires among the more mundane food packaging and beer bottles and cans. I always have a few grocery bags with me in my truck or dry bag for trash. Packed out a busted paddle on a solo trip last year. And I’m passing that ethic along to my kids. We have lake cleanup work days in the HOA from time to time too. Drainage basins collect and concentrate the trash from throughout the neighborhood.

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Woodpuppy,

it’s good to hear that those traits, or habits, are being passed down. Every year at salmon camp, my buddies kids, and all of us adults, clean the trash up where we fish. It’s become a special moment for the kids, they look forward to the fishing and campfire, but they really get excited about cleaning it up. The same thing goes for bout beaches here…. We get so many tourists that our beaches become littered with cigarette butts, tissue, and all sorts of other crap. Both where I live and when I lived in Ohio, we have river cleanups, where we pick up trash on the shores and waterway.

I’ll sometimes see friends or acquaintances on social media posting their cleanups as well. Not everyone practices LNT, or knows about it, but it IS refreshing to see people of all ages doing their part
 
We have a family tradition called “Ten pieces of trash”.

When we are getting ready to pack up and leave a site each of us tries to find ten pieces of trash. Since we all tend to pick up any trash we see during a stay this can become a challenge

Those 10 searched-out treasures usually consist of bottle caps, cigarette butts, twist tie and square clasp bread bag sealers and other small scraps of plastic from food or beverage packaging.

The sometimes challenge of each finding ten pieces of trash is indicative of how heavily, and how messily, a site has been previously used, but is worth it to know that we leave every site cleaner than we found it.
 
Project AWARE.
My Grand Daughter and I are signed up for the Week. We will be up near Alan Gage's area. Looking forward to seeing him again !


Jim
 
Sometimes picking up bobbers can pay off. Many, many (and many more) years ago I was teaching a friend how to stern a canoe on a small PFBC lake. As we were just floating and discussing the whats and hows I noticed a bobber bumping the side of the canoe. I grabbed the bobber and started to pull fishing line out of the water and found a Rapala attached. I started pulling the rest of the line out and to my surprise was a Shakespeare (sp?) rod with a Zebco 33.. That was mid 70's, I still have it.
 
Sometimes trash is challenging. The Bud lite bottles along with Jagermeister we pick up on the Saco after summer is disgusting but I had no idea how to handle an Old Town Disco that had a cut right through the bottom some six feet long. We dragged it onto some poor persons waterfront property in Fryeburg, guessed at the address and contacted the livery to come get it with a truck and lots of man power.
 
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