Two years for a banana skin to decompose ? WTAF?
Two years for a banana skin to decompose ? WTAF?
Perhaps we need a stw experiment to check? 🤔
Generally I am a scruffy lazy git, and I still manage to take all of my rubbish home with me, so I object on behalf of scruffy lazy hits everywhere...
What Nico says ^^.
Fields, hedges etc fine. They disappear within a couple of days.
Mountains, no. Partly it's just much more exposed so any form of litter stands out much more, partly there's nowhere for it to rot down.
ok, I eat a banana most weekdays and the skins are black in my snap tin when I get home, I'll start hanging them on a fence at work and monitor them rather than chucking them on our compost heap, yikes is that not a 'good thing'....?
What is the consensus on what should be done with the banana skin once it’s taken home?
I've this thing called a compost heap.
Helpful as ever, our council also collect compost materials and hot compost the lot a few miles from my house.
I can then collect the soil created, should I wish, a few weeks later.
I'm also of the view that you don't throw a skin anywhere - forest, field, hill. I've even started taking my coffee grounds home, for many years I dug and dumped them.
The only thing I leave now is pee and poop.
Fields, hedges etc fine. They disappear within a couple of days.
Sauce?
It may be some poor farmer is clearing it up so his animals don't eat them...?
Food waste collection is a thing of the past around here, nice while it lasted. Have to pay extra to have garden waste recycled and you mustn't mix the two.
Chap at work leaves a bucket in each of the welfare rooms so he can collect up the banana skins for his allotment.
Isn’t this also a major problem on the walk to everest base camp?
I think dead bodies, empty oxygen bottles and tents are a bigger issue than banana skins in this case.
@funkmasterp hopefully not at the base camp!
There's a 15 day hike a lot of tourists walk to the base camp. It's along this route the banana skins are left.
Higher up the mountain above base camp maybe.
The only thing I leave now is pee and poop.
If you carried it there you can carry it home.
@funkmasterp hopefully not at the base camp!
Reading comprehension fail for me there. They should move some of the bodies down there. Try and put people off
I used to discard them but don’t anymore. They do take longer to decompose. I once found a banana skin in the bottom of a bag that had been there for a good couple of years. It still hasn’t decomposed. It was black and shrivelled but still there. I’m not sure what they’re made of but not so sure they benefit the environment all that much. Nothing eats them. The things don’t even burn on the BBQ so clearly built to withstand all nature can throw at it. I still chuck apple cores away, they decompose a lot quicker. However for a while now on the bike i’ve switched to dried banana chips and dried mango. Very tasty, better form factor for fitting in your pocket. Doesn’t go all mushy if it’s hot and stuffed in there with other stuff and more convenient to eat on the move. And no skin to deal with.
I generally don't take bananas with me when I'm riding as they get a bit battered.
No way does it take 2 years for one to decompose, we'd have half rotten bananas everywhere!
Just to come back with my view - I'm very much in the "leave nothing but footprints" camp. I can't abide any sort of litter, decomposable or not. It's unsightly and unnecessary and at worse presents the view to others that it's OK to dump stuff you can't be bothered to carry back down the hill even though you were prepared to carry something heavier uo it.
On the 2 years figure, it needs some context. If you left an Oak branch on top of Ben Nevis I'm sure the leaves wouldn't decompose in 2 years (they'd blow away right enough).
Whoever said it is situational is right - they would take 2 years to decompose in that environment and therefore the quantity of them makes it unpleasant and unsightly. I'm not disagreeing with it, or saying dropping skins is OK, but the arguments need to be applicable to the situation. Otherwise, Brexit.
Take nothing but photographs, leave nothing but footprints
I’ve even started taking my coffee grounds home, for many years I dug and dumped them.
Good job too as caffeine is produced to reduce competition from other plant life as the coffee bush grows. IT's a really poor soil conditioner in the garden for this reason.
Can someone show a picture of a 2 year old banana skin please, I’ve just google imaged, and not got a single picture.
No way does it take 2 years for one to decompose, we’d have half rotten bananas everywhere!
No, it takes longer than 2 years...it still hadn't decomposed after circa 2 years in the bottom of the bag. It had shrivelled, was black, rock hard and didn't smell at all. It was a bit like a mummified Egyptian's willy... I know it was two years as it had been hanging in my garage for two years since I'd last used it on a walking holiday. I'm not really sure what a rotten banana looks like. Ones that are left in my fruit bowl for weeks go black and very soft but don't grow mould or rot down even though fruit around it might go mouldy and nasty looking, they just seem to continually degrade. Take the fruit out of the skin and the skin dries out and just shrivels and goes hard. Whatever they are made out of doesn't seem to rot or break down. Maybe sitting in my bag affects the decomposition process with the absence of sunlight and bugs and other stuff it would be exposed to in the open, but I'm pretty sure if it was an apple or something else it would have been a furry mouldy and smelly mess.
Can someone show a picture of a 2 year old banana skin please, I’ve just google imaged, and not got a single picture.
You want its birth certificate too?
Discarded banana skins and orange peel always really annoy me. It’s obviously litter unless you live in a place where they grow. So apple cores are fine in hedgerows but not on mountainsides, banana peel in the Seychelles and oranges in Seville. Don’t be a dick, take your litter home.
I always take my litter home
But, whoevers in charge of Ben Nevis (and the surrounding hills) should be making an attempt to build up the soil levels on the hillside.
In ecological terms, it's not long since the last ice sheets left and the forces of erosion (wind, water and temperature) have not yet provided enough of a soil base.
The lack of a sufficient soil base means that there are no trees on the hillsides, except at the lowest levels.
No trees means an exposed hillside.
An exposed hillside means no-where to take shelter from lightning or wind and rain.
That's what puts me off ever going up there...and I'd hate to be 'caught short' on that track😟
Why do guinea pigs go mental for banana skins? All six of ours over the last ~10 years love them.
Is there no guinea pig rescue centre near Ben Nevis?
Anyone carry their shit out? Its now recommended ( certainly for some areas)
Anyone carry their shit out?
Yes, Outward Bound courses do I'm told.
You can prevent this scourge by wrapping your banana skins in a crisp packet before disposal
In 10or 12 outward bound trips to Ullswater with 100s of kids in total the poo tube was knowingly deployed only twice when they realise what they will have to carry out!! Carry your crap out with you please
Classic STW . This will probably run to 100 posts . I chuck mine away just off the trai and still sleep at night .
The lack of a sufficient soil base means that there are no trees on the hillsides, except at the lowest levels.
The tree line in Scotland is only around 600m.
Classic STW . This will probably run to 100 posts . I chuck mine away just off the trai and still sleep at night .
Then you're a massive tosspiece.
Banana skins and human shite and human ashes sprinkled from urns introduce nutrients to places with unique and delicate flora and fauna. You don’t go skipping about on cryptobiotic soil in some places in Moab if you can possibly avoid it. I’m sure some mountain bikers with massive camelbaks can dispose of all their waste responsibly. Maybe take some extra home too?
Still waiting for Trailwaggers, RNs addresses so we know where to leave our banana skins.
I asked a similar question about discarding non native food waste to the farm manager just the other day, it wasn’t in relation to banana skins though...
Potatoes. The estate grows and farms a lot of potatoes and inevitably, some remain in the ground, others are dropped or fall out of the Bailey trailers. How do these non native tubers affect the soil and ecosystem, in much the same manner a banana skin might? Was my specific question.
He shrugged his shoulders.
Custodians of the land 😉
No way does it take 2 years for one to decompose, we’d have half rotten bananas everywhere!
We do (on the mountains), that's the whole issue.
Take nothing but photographs, leave nothing but footprints
I took your advice TJ. Left the bike and my shoes at home and carried a couple of my grandma’s photo albums (one in each hand). It really made the trails come alive!
We do (on the mountains), that’s the whole issue.
While I take my litter home, I've yet to see heaps of discarded banana skins littering the mountain side anywhere, TBH
I agree nikc.
I think part of the reason for that (and this is an informed guess) is because we teach as many as we can to take thier waste home.
It goes with many other wild place / mountain attitudes like being self sufficient, leaving bothies as you would want to find them, helping others in need etc.
Take them home and eat them:
https://thestingyvegan.com/banana-peel-vegan-pulled-pork-sandwich/
Jeebus, I've spent almost 25 years working for organisations trying to promote sensible environmental policies, but reading this thread gave me a feeling of enormous hopelessness.
As the good book (should have) said;
The stupid will always be with you, but now they're breeding with the trolls.
So I'm off to find a wilderness with "not enough soil" as apparently thats the perfect place to take a big shit on a banana skin.
Onward and upward!
I’ve yet to see heaps of discarded banana skins littering the mountain side anywhere, TBH
Top of Tryfan was a good place to see this. Orange peel and banana skins. It's been a while since I was up there mind.
No, it takes longer than 2 years…it still hadn’t decomposed after circa 2 years in the bottom of the bag. It had shrivelled, was black, rock hard and didn’t smell at all. It was a bit like a mummified Egyptian’s willy… I know it was two years as it had been hanging in my garage for two years since I’d last used it on a walking holiday.
Because a British hedgerow mimics the conditions inside your garage? That's obviously why fresh fruit lasts just as long as dried fruit. Ohh no, wait a moment fresh fruit rots..........
Below the treeline a banana skin (or Apple core, or orange peel, or kiwi skin, or whatever fruit you want to eat) is going to disappear pretty quickly.
I mean I must eat 10 banana a week, most of those end up on our compost heap, they don't last a week there.
As with most things I'd apply the principal of "what would happen if everyone did this". Banana skins on Ben Nevis, definitely cary them home. Crimping one of like a bear in some woods miles from anywhere with only the occasional visitor, kick a hole in the dirt and get on with it. Banana skin whilst riding, sling it into the undergrowth, it'll disappear to dust, But maybe not at a trail center which would get a bit manky if everyone did it.
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Take nothing but photographs, leave nothing but footprints
I took your advice TJ. Left the bike and my shoes at home and carried a couple of my grandma’s photo albums (one in each hand). It really made the trails come alive!
I hope you left your clothes at home as well! 😉
Rather than join in justifying why I drop banana skins, ignoring any evidence to the contrary that is placed before me, I going to change my habit as a result of this thread and stop chucking banana peel. Am I banned?
That vegan 'pulled pork' can f*** right off though..:)
The park rangers responsible for keeping the place nice and safe for everyone have asked us not to do it.
If you don't have food waste recycling at home, pester your local council.
