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My young grandson loves hiking, exploring, and looking for wildlife big and small in local parks and conservation areas.
Lately, with our strict isolation measures, he has frequented the parks and local wild spaces more often than ever.
People who normally might choose other venues than exploring their local conservation area are now flocking to them huge number
Research emphatically tells us connecting with the flora and fauna in our natural surroundings enhances our physical and mental well-being by lowering our blood pressure, reducing our stress hormones and boosting our immune system.
Normally, one would eagerly applaud the fact that more people are enjoying the great outdoors.
Unfortunately, instead of applause my grandson has been extremely upset as he can no longer look for bugs!
Why, you might ask?
Wherever he ventured out, as far as the eye can see, the forest floor was completely blanketed with mounds of unsightly litter from polypropylene masks to a myriad of plastic bags and containers.
My grandson wanted to clean up the litter as he had learned — from a very early age — about the alarmingly detrimental impact of litter on our environment, wildlife, and humans.
This is what he learned.
If he had had a picnic in a local park and left behind a plastic shopping bag, that plastic bag could eventually cause the agonizing death of a dolphin, a beaked whale or a sea turtle.
He could not understand how a plastic bag could cause the death of a dolphin that does not even live in a lake!
So it was explained to him single plastic bags carelessly thrown on the ground might take up to 1,000 years to decompose. The wind could blow it around for many years and eventually it might end up in a river. All rivers flow to one of our four oceans.
After many years of floating around, the plastic bag will start to break into countless pieces. An albatross, a dolphin, and a turtle could end up trying to eat the plastic pieces and suffer a slow, agonizing death.
Since my grandson wanted to pick up the litter, his mom bought him a litter picker.
He loves it! He thinks searching for trash, spearing it with his litter picker is a fun game. He takes it with him on all his outings. (Picker can be folded.)
Parents, whose kids want to pick up trash as well, are constantly asking where to buy one for their kids.
Last weekend, when he came for an outdoor visit, he picked up four bags of trash close to the shoreline of Kempenfelt Bay.
Much to our grandson's delight one man was so impressed he personally thanked our grandson and handed him a toonie.
So it’s obvious that kids at a certain age love the idea of picking up trash as long as they can use a special picker.
Then, it occurred to me, just like the city sells rain barrels to the public every spring, why don’t they start selling litter pickers.
Definitely a win-win-win!
The kids would get great exercise and experience a wonderful sense of accomplishment. Not only are they protecting the ecological health of Lake Simcoe, but they are helping to prevent the untimely death of marine animals.
The city staff would have more time to use their training and unique expertise working permanent improvements in the city.
And finally, all residents and tourists would appreciate and enjoy a pristine lakeshore not marred by litter.
Gwen Petreman
Barrie
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