I can still feel the stinging nettles I walked through earlier today. It was well worth it though. Two bags of recyclables and one of trash. As much as I had hoped to get yesterday, but when I went out to my car yesterday there was a screw in one of my front tires. So yesterday there was no collecting or post. Tried making up for it today. Met a friend of mine at Minisink Park, she was searching for insects for an entomology course and I was searching for trash.
We went down the Brodhead and there were a few items, not all that much though. Just about to the Delaware any semblance of a clear path faded into down trees, thick brush and Japanese Knotweed. So we turned back and did a loop around one of the ball fields at the park.
So for the first walk through for me I collected a little over half a bag of mostly all recyclables. If you look closely there is another golf club sticking out of the bag. I find golf clubs almost everywhere when I don't expect to. My friend did get some insects, but we really didn't see to many today. She left and I headed back to check out Schellenberger's Island. The last time I was there was about three years ago and at that time there were massive debris piles with lots of trash.
A view looking up river from the top of the island. I had to go around the edge of the island because the areas I had previously gone into easily years back had all grown in with knotweed.
Not far down the east shore of the island this canoe passed me. It may seem like I complain about boater safety a lot on here, but it is important. This is a perfect example of what not to do when canoeing, especially on the Delaware. Notice no personal floatation devices, the person in the front playing with a phone not paying attention and the gentleman in back has a nice fluffy cape tied around his neck while paddling standing up. These things are no good on the water. Be safe and don't be like these people.
Two shopping carts today. These I can probably get another time, if I pull them out one at a time and leave them by the trash cans in the park.
From what I remember the island did not look like this three years ago. It had a much greater diversity of plants and knotweed for the most part was non-exisitant. Japanese Knotweed is a non-native plant that spreads quickly and as you can see outcompetes our native plants. It is nearly impossible to get rid of and as it spreads down our streams and rivers we loose a lot of diversity. Areas like this island that go through a lot of disturbance due to flooding are places that knotweed easily takes hold and will not give up its place easily. For now it seems it is a plant that we just have to live with until someone can come up with a good cost effective solution to get rid of it.
There was some trash, but not much on the east shore, mostly old aluminum cans, I didn't think I would have much to show for my time spent out today. Then I rounded the bottom of the island and found a small cut back onto the island that was full of debris piles.
I had planned on only collecting recyclables today, but there was so much styrofoam and footwear that I started filling a bag with that.
The recycling bag filled up quickly and I got picked up more than half a bag of trash.
It wasn't easy getting back to the mainland shore. The river bottom had deep sediment beds and the area I crossed was around four foot deep. I was really nervous crossing with my camera and Penny was along too. Made it without a problem and Penny had a good swim. The bags did fill up with water a bit so it made it somewhat difficult getting them back to the car.
Almost left out the best piece of the day. This little fella was hanging out in the string of debris piles.
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