The Language of Litter

In the early years we lived on this place, the “Lori measuring stick” ruled as I made my weekly rounds in the electric buggy, picking up neighborhood trash on our ten acres. I ranted and grumbled about the carelessness of our neighbor’s lack of trash disposal. I had expectations about how people should respectfully keep up the appearance of their yards and housing. Because other’s did not treat trash the way I was brought up to, I had a real mess of ill thoughts floating around in my head each week as I picked up all sorts of discarded rubble.  Didn’t people know to bag their loose trash? Why did people just toss litter from their cars as they drove down the streets? And why on earth would people chunk large items of rubbish like old bicycles, tires, busted flower pots, garden hoses, and broken lawn chairs, over the alley fence into our woods?

This view might help in understanding the boundary lines where we concentrate on trash pick up. I also noted the area where a neighbor dumps deer discards. He harvests deer at another location during hunting season, and dumps the carcass near the fence where our property lines meet after he cleans and butchers them. We pick up the bones as we find them in order to deter drawing coyotes to the area.

View of City Park from the orchard fence.

View along north fence of pecan orchard.

Alley view looking west. Our property is on the right.

This is the SW corner of the alley area. People used to dump large items back here. Using game cameras, we once caught a neighbor dumping shrubs and stump debris on our side of the fence. I lost my temper the day I confronted him, but it never happened again.

This area is no longer a dumping area for passersby in the alley. I patrol it bi-weekly and we keep watch with game cameras.

As time went on and the trash floating about the property was more under control, I began to see beyond my own discontent about community trash. I noticed the effects of human discards on the environment and, specifically, on wildlife. I found birds entangled in string or ribbon from balloons, and in a farmer’s discarded hay bale netting. I once found a snake that had suffocated in a plastic bottle. And of course I had witnessed Daisy deer pick up shiny trash out of curiosity – usually she spit the garbage out, but a few times she ingested it. Sometimes, I discovered small bits of refuse in fox and coyote scat. And one day while walking in the woods behind our home, I discovered a fox hole with lots of meat packaging, fast food, and snack bags littering the immediate area. It dawned on me then, that wildlife was bringing some of the trash on our property. My attitude about people’s reckless regard for the land and the wildlife that lived here got even worse. Did I live among idiots? Were people lazy and just did not care about the impact on our environment?

This neighbor allows their three dogs to tear up all sorts of furniture and trash, which south winds blow through our fence into the woods. Lately they’ve had a skunk problem. After killing them, they throw the dead bodies along our fence line.

This wheat field is littered with lots of trash. The south winds carry most of that onto our property. It’s endless work collecting it.

Sometimes I take a poke in the eye trying to get to trash in the weeds and plant life.

The busy road by the city park is fraught with beer and liquor bottles. I occasionally find boxed beer hidden in our wild grapevine in the alley. I suspect a buyer leaves it for a minor to pickup, and I just happen to get to it first (usually when I’m mowing). Finder’s keepers I say!! By the way, don’t ask me how I would know about minors finding buyers for alcohol…

The farmer who tends to the fields to the west and south must like Taco Mayo coffee. I find these cups often as I cross the fields on hikes to the river. I smile when I see the quotes. At least they’re inspiring!

This cake container has become a green house of sorts for the weeds growing under it. Nature found a way to utilize the plastic. This blew from the housing addition south of our orchard property.

Another tossed coffee cup from Taco Mayo in another wheat field.

The old river channel gets a lot of litter from the bridge crossing at the busy road. It’s very difficult to reach most of the trash down there as it’s a snarl of vine and brambles, not to mention poison ivy and snakes!

This is a common sight in our woodlands and everywhere on the property. I really wish these types of bags would be banned.

I found it strange to find a hanger on the fence line near the slough.

When we purchased the fifty-two acres of pecan property, the range of trash pickup increased tremendously. At first the job was so great that FD and I took buggy rides around the property lines, filling fifty-gallon trash bags. With the city park to our north along a very busy road, and a Walmart Super Center and a new housing addition along the south fence lines of the orchard property, the task seemed overwhelming at first. After almost two years, the job is more manageable and most of the time I do the trash collecting job alone, except on holidays or after events when the city park just across the road to the north sees increased activity. We still have a lot of agricultural trash to deal with on the property – old tires, hydraulic hoses, metal from old implements, wire fencing, and plastic waste from livestock buckets and feeders. Cleaning up all that is a bigger task, and one we simply have not found the time to achieve.

It did not take me long to realize my anger and irritation about the issue of human litter only served to keep me twisted up. Rather than gripe and complain about something I could never control, I accepted that cleaning up after others was part of being a steward of the land. Over time, I just picked up the debris and looked for the silver lining in the work before me. I was the lucky person to be working outdoors in nature. It was good exercise. I learned about people’s eating and drinking habits, and made discoveries about other aspects of people’s lifestyles. It could be rather entertaining sometimes. And best of all, I was improving the environment.

Trash picked up last weekend, that blew over from the park .

I find shoe soles of shoes quite often in the orchard pasture. I imagine they wash down from the city park or maybe the river during heavy rains and flooding.

A very weathered Doritos chip bag, silted into the earth by rain over time.

Our property is littered with dozens of old tires. Someday we will have to deal with this problem. Many are buried in the dirt from years of being silted in by flood waters.

A fallen soldier found on the buggy path to the canyon. I wonder if this belonged to one of FD’s siblings or cousins years ago?

I found this gruesome scene down at the river one afternoon. Apparently this headless female has been decomposing for many years by the looks of that leg! I wonder what brand of panties she’s wearing – they seem to be indestructible!

Collection of trash near old river channel.

The previous owner of the orchard filled this ravine on the property with lots of farm trash. We will have to either bury this or clean it up someday. I picked up the pink Mylar balloon in the lower left corner. We find Mylar balloons on a daily basis. These should be banned, as should all balloons.

I found this blue styrofoam litter down near the river last week. The bright color was easy to spot from a distance. The pretty color lured me that direction out of curiosity.

I suspect this glove belonged to the poacher hunter I spotted last fall. It was in the precise area I saw him walking in November, decked out in his camouflage.

A child’s shoe, down by the river.

I found this insole in the orchard near the slough.

Most of the time, FD and I are both in the habit of tucking a trash bag in a pocket and collecting what we find on hikes to the river, and I always carry a bucket or bag as I work in various locations on the property. Last week I meandered off to the wheat field south of our orchard property, between the housing addition and Walmart. I picked up the loose trash that had collected along the wheat field just on the other side of our fence. With warm breezes and wind from the south over the spring and summer months, we will eventually get the loose trash that blows from that area into our woodlands. I think of it as preventive conservation, to nab the trash before it finds its way on our side of the fence.

Squirrels often use trash to line their nests. This is Francesca and Buddy, two orphans we raised after we accidentally disturbed their home. https://littlesundog.wordpress.com/2015/03/22/taking-down-a-widow-maker/  Their mama sure did make a pretty nest with Walmart bags and wood shavings.

My mind no longer festers with ugly thoughts about the people who carelessly and thoughtlessly discard their trash. Sometimes the trash speaks to me, bringing a chuckle or a thought for pondering. Sometimes I think up a story about how some item of trash might have ended up where it did. There are times I marvel at the creativity of birds and mammals who utilize human trash in their nests and shelters. Every once in a while, I am personally rewarded for my efforts by finding something I can use.

Occasionally, we find old bottles partially buried in dirt. Last week I found this minion toy in our fence line across from the city park. I chuckled thinking I sure felt like a minion picking up all of that trash! Especially when some jerk drove by and threw a plastic pop container my way and said, “Here’s another one!!”, as it landed in the ditch. I keep the soldier toy around to remind me that I am a fearless protector of the land and the wildlife that lives here. The Eeyore patch was one I found discarded in the Walmart parking lot one morning. It reminds me that my negative Eeyore tendencies do not have to rule. I picked up the smurf artist last week as I gathered trash in the ditch along the city park road.  I smiled and thought about how we are all artists of the landscape, when we create something better.

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