CITO Event

[+Inmountains]

Yesterday, I had the privilege of attending my first CITO event, cleaning up the Jetty between Seal Beach and Alamitos Bay, in Southern California. As most of you can imagine, the amount of trash that washes into the Pacific Ocean in the Los Angeles area is measured in the MILLIONS of TONS! We had around 40 folks there, working for an hour, and I am sure we topped 1,000 pounds of garbage picked up. It felt good to give back to the community in this way. Certain groups, such as the Boy Scouts, the Girl Scouts, etc... also do clean up and we all appreciate their work. But it is a shame that so much trash gets put into our oceans. I wish we could have more events like this to help clean up our communities. There was another thread where I made a semi-joke about the affect Geocachers have on the environment is about as much of an effect as a Butterfly Burp has on the environment. If I put out a "pound of plastic" and pick up "100 pounds of trash", have I had a positive or negative affect on the environment? Plus the fact that I PICK UP every pound of plastic I put out when I archive the cache. I have had discussions with Forest Rangers who do not like geocaching, and when I ask why, they said they don't want to see trash strewn all over the forest. So I politely ask them if they have ever seen a Geocache spilled out and strewn all over the forest and every time they say NO. And when I ask them if they have seen trash strewn all over by backpackers, hunters, fishermen, campers, hikers, mountain bikers, prospectors, etc..., they always say yes. I try to tell them that Geocachers actually PICK UP more trash than we ever leave behind (at least most of us do). So THANK YOU to all who attended a CITO event and remember, we can pick up trash any and every day we are in the field.

[+Path Pacer]

I used to pick up trash in my neighborhood before I ever started geocaching. Found a $100 bill once.