Lehigh River (23-Feb-2017)

Earlier in the year when we had a few days of nice weather I started working on a flood plain off of the Lehigh River just below Lehighton. With another nice day I decided to go back and continue on where I left off. The above photo shows where I started and where the Mahoning Creek flows into the Lehigh.

One of the first finds of the day! This one wasn't even broken, like in most cases though it was full of sediment.

I had found this barrel on my first walk through this section and I figured this trip was as good as any to remove it. It too had a good amount of sediment inside which I had to clean out before hauling it out. These kinds of barrels are somewhat common in the river. Often times they are used as trash cans in parks and somehow find there way into the river if they are not chained down. 

This is the kind of area that would be nearly impossible to pick through later in the year. When the leafs start coming in all of the trash becomes hidden. Early river clean-ups on foot do have benefits.

These are two larger items I pulled out of the are in the photo above this one. This is not the first time I have found parts of target deer near the river. 

A river beer and and assortment of other items I found picking through the debris piles. From what I have found Pabst is the most commonly lost beer on the Lehigh, I have found many unopened ones.

What drew me to working on this area originally was the bucket in this photo. I saw it every time I passed over the bridge in Lehighton and I really wanted to get it. The problem is it is on an island and not retrievable at this time of year by foot. From the bridge it did look like I could possibly get to it.

A full contractor size bag, a barrel, wheel and fake deer part made a pretty good haul for the day. Still there was much more to take out of this area and I would be back again for more. 

After hauling everything out I sorted the recyclables from trash by the entrance of the D&L Trail. The trash was left in the barrel by other trash receptacles at this site. Soon I would be back to get more out of this location. On this day though I wasn't going out for another round, instead my next destination was Mauch Chunk Lake for the first paddle of the year!

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