The Prospect Park Woodland Youth Crew helped us out on Tuesday, giving us a nice boost. Otherwise we were an all-girl crew - Inge, Olga and me, and a Natural Resources staff member.
The good: When we started this all, on May 10th, the worst area was around the feet of two soaring tulip trees (Liriodendron tulipfera). We literally raked condoms up. I don't think anyone had been there to clean in ...years? Ever? Brush from exotic or invasive bushes was then cut by the Natural Resources crew to make access to the tree trunks - the preferred spots for sexual hookups - difficult. The forest floor has been trampled here into a concrete-like surface. No undergrowth of perennials could possibly take root or survive, and rainwater cannot permeate easily to reach the roots of these tree giants.
Last Tuesday there was very little new litter in this area, save for around an old log whose habits die hard, it seems. So, that was good.
Bad: The slope that leads up the ridge to Ricks' Place was still pretty foul, and one has to take great care not to step in anything horrible. Condoms are one thing, human excrement another. There are toilets a ten minute walk away. They may be locked at night, though. Although how the hell anyone sees at night is another question - there is a lot of traffic in the day, and I'm curious about whether it really is that much heavier after dark; these slopes are very steep, there are brambles and thorny plants and poison ivy. Head lamps?
These are the things upon which one ponders, sack in hand, a callus developing on the thumb where we repeatedly click open the metal jaws of the tireless grabber.
[Thanks to Brenda of Flatbush for the link love and support]
1 comment:
Other readers and volunteers do not know me. I'm a long way from Brooklyn (NE Australia, in fact!)
But I do care about the human trend to dump rubbish, expecting "the authorities" to clean up our trash.
So I proposed to Marie that on the days the Littermob goes to the Midway I will collect trash in my local area.
This week, I picked up drink cans,plastic bags, candy wrappers, styrene burger boxes and a chunk of ....heavy metal.
True, this is a much more open area of mangrove-to-beachfront so it does not (I presume!) attract sad, lonely men. But that doesn't mean it should be a garbage dump!
Kudos to Marie and all who are helping.
Post a Comment