Another long trip from Sand Island to Canal Park and back. In total two bags of recyclables, two bags of trash, a broken lawn chair, a headless plastic deer, a child size sled and a purple tote were taken off of the canal and river today. Was on the water from around 12:30 this afternoon to 7:30 tonight. This paddle was not supposed to take as long as the last time I completed it.
The day started off as usual, empty boat bags ready and I was ready to get out on the water. When I put on the canal I paddled a little bit down stream to shoreline I haven't cleaned yet. Found some bottles underneath overhanging branches and went in, grabbed them and started backpaddling out....
I felt the back of the boat hit a branch behind me and I thought nothing of it. When I passed the branch, I was suddenly surrounded by a cloud of vespid/paper wasps. I kept backpaddling, now much faster and prepared to be stung. Luckily the majority of the wasps flew back to the nest when I got far enough away and I didn't receive a single sting. Remember this if you ever paddle by low branches. I have seen vespid wasp nests over water like this before, but never had such a close call.
In my mind the canal was going to be a breeze and I was just going to paddle through and get to the river. It did not work out that way. I kept finding pockets of trash that were missed on the previous two trips though. This little pile I understand, it was pretty well hidden.
For this pile I must have had my eyes closed when I passed it the last time. It was very visible from the middle of the canal and there was a lot packed in there and to the left of this photo.
This time I also pulled both recyclables and garbage off the bottom in the shallow stretches. That's where the road cone in the bag came from.
If someone told me I was going to see giraffes on the canal, I would have just given them a disproving stare.
Did Hook finally kill Peter Pan? Who is Jake? I did think it was funny how the designer of this ball used the fill hole as an eye for the crocodile.
This was the haul from the canal. Once again the recyclables from the canal took up more space than I wanted them to for the way back. The garbage was discarded in the proper receptacle on the way to the river.
This little critter is a turtle leech. For the most part they do not bother humans, unless the human is bothered just by the sight of them. Most wild turtles have these leeches on them and I often find these leeches on smooth trash items that I pull out of muddy areas. It could be that they think the surface resembles a turtleshell or they might just like hanging out on smooth items. This one came off of the road cone.
Back to the river yet again.
Turtles aren't seen as much on the river as they are on the canal. This is just a Painted Turtle, I have posted photos of them before. I just liked seeing this one on the river for some reason.
On who's orders should I not disturb this? I just wonder what the average person on a weekend paddling the river would think of an item like this. I could see someone finding this, then finding a musky jaw on the bank and thinking that the government released some kind of genetically altered fish monster. My guess is that there was some kind of plant in it originally. It would have been nice if it was labeled. Also, if this is biodegradable what is it made of?
Someone lost their face heart. It is now in the garbage.
If this didn't smell I would have brought it home. Coupled with the mask I found earlier this summer it would have made and excellent halloween yard decoration and both items would have got at least one more use. However it did smell, worse than most discarded items found on the river, so it went directly into the trash.
Took a different channel than normal and stopped at a different island. It was past six by this point and I was wondering if I would make it off the river before dark. Also didn't want to get back in the kayak because sitting in it for so long gets extremely uncomfortable.
Stopped for the purple bin and wasn't going to stop again. I really wasn't, but I got to an area that years ago had a great rope swing. The tree is still there and there is a small silt beach. It was one of my favorite places on this section of river and it was trashed. Someone must have had a party there over the weekend. Beer cans everywhere, meat and buns in bags, condiments barely used all thrown throughout the area. I took my time and took nearly everything. I won't mention what I left behind, it was things that shouldn't ever be let by the river or anywhere except a garbage can. I took no pictures of the mess because I didn't want to see it again. I really loved that place and I loved the rope swing.
The only thing I don't like about this photo is that this can is really close to the river. I just imagined people taking these items and throwing them back in. Why would I imagine this? Because that's what people seem to do. The garbage can itself is chained to the telephone pole. The parks people know what happens. Not chained down, ends up in the river. I just hope they do make it to the landfill, it wasn't an easy balancing act to get them to this point and I don't want to do it again further down stream.
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