State Gamelands (24-Mar-2016)

I took a break away from working on the Lehigh to help a friend find a suitable study site for her grad project. I knew there would be trash anywhere we went and this was a good chance to see new areas and clean up some new trails. To protect potential study areas and the wildlife being studied, I am unable to give out location information. Above is the first stream we scouted. Beavers have created nice wetland areas along this stream, but this was not the type of habitat we were hoping to find.

One of the beaver dams up close. Beavers really do a great job of turning a stream into a series of ponds. 

Batteries especially larger ones like these do not belong in the woods. Someone left these two on the edge of the parking lot we used for the first stop. I don't mind taking these one bit. They are one trash item that is actually worth something. If you take these to a scrap yard you can currently get around seven dollars each for them. If you are not looking to get a return, but still need to get rid of a battery like this, most automotive places will just take them off your hands. The woods is not a proper disposal site for them.

Other than the batteries this was all I found at the first site. We also did not find any sections of the stream that fit the criteria needed. It was off to the next site with hopes of better luck. 

Here we went to check out the outflow on this large beaver pond. Both of us thought this outflow stream would be much better than the last site. It was not. Also, my camera ended up in this pond. It is not waterproof. Penny was along and was part of it taking a swim. 

Before the camera took a dip, I was able to get a shot of this hellgrammite walking across a rock on the bottom of the pond. As I have stated in previous posts, hellgrammites will become dobsonflies as adults. 

Kelly Murman is the graduate student I am helping with finding her study sites. She was kind enough to take this photo of the trash I collected on this second scouting mission of the day. It might not seem like a lot, but this was an area I did clean up last year. Much of it was new, there was some old stuff that I had previously missed. Thanks again Kelly for taking the photo!  
You too can help with taking out the trash! If you get out hiking take a grocery bag with you, give it a second use and fill it with trash while you are out! Every bit helps. You can also help contributing to this project here: Help Fund Taking Out the Trash

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Nescopeck State Park (18-Dec-2015)

Hit the trails at Nescopeck State Park today, it ended up being a good choice. On my previous visits to this park, it has always been fairly clean. Although I did get a good amount of trash, it wasn't nearly as bad as the single trail I took yesterday. 

The first items of the day.

Like used diapers, I do not pick up full dog waste bags. There were many of them around Lake Frances. This is another thing that I can't figure out. An individual takes the time to pick up the dog waste with a plastic bag, ties it and throws it into the woods. If you aren't going to take care of the bag, why even bag it. Almost all of the bags I saw today were ones that the park gives out for dog waste disposal, by giving them out the DCNR is adding to the plastic waste littered around the park.

This is the work of some of the residents of Lake Frances. On the left is a recently felled Birch tree. The right, the lodge of the tree fellers. Nescopeck State Park has a healthy population of Beavers and the ones in this lodge enjoy the safety of living in a no hunting zone. 

Below Lake Frances, the beavers of this lodge had damed a culvert to raise the water surrounding their home. The local humans must have had a problem with this, they removed the plug on the culvert and drained the beavers watery oasis.

 It was interesting that after passing this sign I found no more dog waste bags on the trail sides. Now I don't think the sign has much to do with it, but I still found it funny. I think the reason the dog waste bags were all around the Lake and nowhere else along the trails was as a result of the lazy people who can't carry out a dog bag also don't go far from their cars. Fun fact: The lake is also the closest location to trash cans.

The bottle on the left was another that had a plastic cup on the bottom. There is a good likelihood that this bottle has been there since before the area became a State Park. The item on the left was along the stream. It was the seat to a tricycle.

The majority of the trash today was along the trails and the section of stream I walked was devoid of trash, with the exception of the tricycle piece. I found it refreshing walking a waterway that had pretty much no trash on its banks. 

This ballon was some distance off the trail. The bright shinny blue drew me to it. Please don't let balloons go into the air. That can't be said enough, it is the same as littering. 

When I got back to my car I could hear something moving around in the brush on the other side of the parking lot. I then heard bells, followed by a pheasant distress call and I watched a pheasant flying off with a ringing hawk in pursuit. This got my attention, I walked over for a closer look. The hawk was called back by a falconer in the brush. Can you see the two of them? 

In total while I was there the hawk flushed three birds. I think it was just being trained and was not actually hunting. No pheasants were harmed while I was watching.

This is what I removed off of the trails. 

After taking the non-recyclables to the nearest trash can I found this in the brush along the parking lot.

You too can help with taking out the trash! If you get out hiking take a grocery bag with you, give it a second use and fill it with trash while you are out! Every bit helps. You can also help contributing to this project here: Help Fund Taking Out the Trash