Trash Free Trails Report Highlights Impact On Wildlife

Often the impact of litter – or rubbish, or pollution – on our trails and in our wild spaces is seen as an aesthetic threat. Something that offends ou …

By stwhannah

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Trash Free Trails Report Highlights Impact On Wildlife

I often wonder but have never googled – what impact does takeaway processed fast food have on wildlife?

The crows/pigeons/rats/urban foxes etc that clear up after humans – is their lifespan shortened by eating discarded McDonald’s/kebabs/pavement pizza etc? Let alone being killed by discarded packaging litter as per TRT’s report.

Humans are absolute sh*ts sometimes.

I am even more determined to carry on picking up litter when I am out and about.

I’m not entirely sure what the purpose of this report is. We all know dropping litter is bad for the environment as well as an eyesore.  We don’t need a report to tell us. That then begs the question who is the reported aimed at and will it have any impact on that target audience. I suspect very little at best.

I’m the opposite, I reckon stuff like this is worth reporting as I’m pretty sure a lot of people just don’t think about it. A group of young riders in the summer were at a local spot and started getting ready to leave and left all their litter lying around. I asked them to pick it up and take it home with them and 2 of the kids asked why as they are doing the job of the cleaners. The rest of their friends asked them what cleaner sand they were convinced there were people who went through the woods during the night and collected all the rubbish and cleared it away! Of the 7 kids, 2 had this weird thought, 1 admitted to just being lazy and not clearing any rubbish away and the other 4 collected it all and got it in a bag and 1 of them carried it out the woods.

The outdoors is filled with far more ignorant people these days and any education that helps point out issues is a good thing.

 That then begs the question who is the reported aimed at and will it have any impact on that target audience. I suspect very little at best.

Blimey, can’t believe I’m agreeing with you twice in a week but I concur. Trash Free Trails is a bunch of middle class outdoor enthusiasts who want people to stop dropping litter who are targeting all their work at middle class outdoor enthusiasts who know dropping litter is bad and probably don’t do it on websites targeted at the same audience rather than targeting all classes of more casual outdoor users with more widespread campaigns.

It’s all very sweet and well intentioned, but whoever’s in charge of their marketing and outreach really needs to change how they do it or their organisation is pointless. Even some posters in honeypot site car parks with pictures of animals dying in crisp packets would help.

I’m the opposite, I reckon stuff like this is worth reporting as I’m pretty sure a lot of people just don’t think about it.

Also, getting stats for what type of litter it is and where it is mostly coming from will help a lot with targeting organisations and consumers of specific types of litter potentially.

I’m not entirely sure what the purpose of this report is. We all know dropping litter is bad for the environment

I’m really not sure we ‘all’ know that sadly. A lot of people do actually need telling what many others can work out for themselves pretty easily.

Of course you can’t do much about the dilligafs.

I’m really not sure we ‘all’ know that sadly. A lot of people do actually need telling what many others can work out for themselves pretty easily.

And

I’m the opposite, I reckon stuff like this is worth reporting as I’m pretty sure a lot of people just don’t think about it

None of whom will even know this report exists, let alone read it and change their behaviour as a result.

Ye of little faith (although I’m not disagreeing with you on it)…I’d hope this will be farmed out to everywhere so that more people see it and will start to act accordingly. Agree that having it posted here is likely to have less of an impact, but hopefully this is just one of a large number of places this is getting mentioned.

I’ve seen a change with the kids I coach – none would proactively throw litter away, but many wouldn’t do a quick check to make sure nothing had been left. Now, they all seem to be very quick to let the person know if a wrapper has fallen out a pocket or not been put back in a bag. Change does happen, but it needs to be proactively encouraged for it to then become the norm.

Where else have you seen Trash Free Trails stuff mentioned? I don’t get it fed to me in my social media adverts, I don’t see it out on the trails, I haven’t seen it on general news websites. I’ve seen it here and in a bike shop. I don’t think they’re spreading the message far and wide.

I don’t do much social media but I’ve seen it here and on my limited Facebook feed (and other than those 2 sites, I visit BBC news daily, but not seen anything there).

I’m also local to a few TFT spots that get used for trail clearing and there is stuff round these spots.

Some of the kids I coach have TFT stickers on their bikes.

I probably have more generic exposure to TFT due to my location, but they do good stuff, so worth having a read and sharing.

Last year they had a report picked up by the Guardian about single use plastic in the environment.

I just found it interesting that their focus switched from all litter to just single use plastic for that report. Nothing to do with Red Bull giving them a load of cash…

Before Red Bull became a strategic partner, Red Bull cans were listed as one of the most common items they found. Then it was all about the plastic and Lucozade bottles were top of the list.

Last report thing I saw it was lucozade, something else and red bull cans…so it seems to still be getting reported.

To answer some of the points above:

TFT did develop the Trash Mob Academy – definitely not a middle class audience or project! It’s a free to use and adaptable curriculum that can be applied to a variety of settings: https://www.trashfreetrails.org/post/welcome-to-the-trashmob-academy

They also worked up an event scheme, to encourage event organisers to limit waste at source. I think that’s been quite effective at introducing things like water points (so you don’t end up with loads of plastic water bottles) at events. They had a spot in the Hardline broadcast last year I think – surely pretty good for reaching a broader audience?

https://www.trashfreetrails.org/tft-approved#:~:text=TFT%20Approved%20is%20a%20completely,in%20sustainable%20outdoor%20race%20events.

If you’re interested in challenging then (in my experience they’re quite open to it) or finding out more, they’ve got a summit in London next month you can go to: https://www.trashfreetrails.org/event-details/our-trails-gathering-1

I’m really not sure we ‘all’ know that sadly. A lot of people do actually need telling what many others can work out for themselves pretty easily.

I’ve often thought that rules are there mostly for the folks who can’t work things out for themselves – unfortunately those are the folks who either still don’t get it, when it’s explained to them, or take great umbrage at being asked to behave considerately.

It’s all rather sad, TBH.

keystone mammal species such as voles, mice and shrews. Two notable instances involved glass bottles, with volunteers in Eryri (Snowdonia) finding an endangered bank vole inside a Peroni Beer bottle in Beddgelert Forest

Bank Voles aren’t endangered. They’re a common and widespread species.

That’s such a basic mistake.