A recent entry from my blog on http://sites.google.com/site/backpackthesierra/home

Anybody else frustrated about this?



WHAT IS IT ABOUT FISHERMEN?

"Fishermen are pigs."

The lovely M was looking down into the water, where she saw an old jar of salmon eggs lying among the stones. We were fifteen miles from the nearest trailhead in a stunning part of Yosemite. It was a beautiful, isolated lake at 10,000 feet, with nice-sized trout and gin clear water. Towering peaks loomed over it, rosy in the evening light.

I would have said it was pristine, except that pristine means unspoiled. And this water was spoiled by an idiot fisherman.

I had to agree with my wife. To be fair, I have made the comment many times to her, so she wasn't trying to start an argument. Fishermen are pigs. They leave fish guts in the lake. They leave lures on logs in lakes. They leave strings of monofilament draped on trees and bushes along streams. And they leave paper and plastic packaging on almost every stream in California.

So what is it about fishermen?

Maybe some of them are so focused on catching fish that they don't realize exactly what they are doing. But at 10,000 feet, fifteen miles in? You have to be a real jerk to litter up a lake at that point. You have to be pig.

And yes, I am a fisherman. I fish every chance I get. And sometimes I lose a fly, or mess up some monofilament leader. When I do, I make every effort to clear up the mess, so the next guy can actually experience the same beauty, the same "pristine" conditions.

But I can't remember the last time I went fishing and didn't collect some kind of debris, detritus, or trash that had been left by a fisherman. I have waded out into lakes to pull that lure off the log. I have spent half an hour winding the monofilament out of the bushes along side the river. I have used my fly to pull up fish guts from the bottom of the lake so that I could leave them on a rock nearby, to be eaten by a raccoon or other friendly scavenger.

Every time I go fishing, I end up with a pocket full of trash left by my fishermen friends. And every time I empty that pocket into our trash back at camp, I say the same thing:

"Fishermen are pigs."

Not ALL fishermen are pigs.

Just as in all things in life, there are those who are considerate and those who are not.

I fish and I pack out all my trash and some of others, at least what I can carry.

People are pigs my friend. Unfortunately, the numbers are the reverse of our Social Security system. There are more people putting in than taking out. It burns my backside when I hear all these politically correct people talking their garbage about how much they love our planet and how we should all do our part...... yadda yadda yadda.... More often than not, most people are all talk and don't give a crap about what they leave behind. The real truth is that most of them are too lazy or see themselves as being "entitled" and above picking up their own trash. (One of those lowlife backpackers will take care of the garbage. That's below me. I'm here to talk about it and put on a good verbal show.)

Dang, you've lit a fire under my butt here! I can't tell you how this topic scalds my butt! If half the people that talk the game would back it up with action, the world would be sooo much better off. The sad fact is though, by and large most people are all talk. They like to hear themselves talk but are too lazy and consider themselves above all others to actually clean up after themselves.

My parents told me long ago.... and it will always be true: "Talk is cheap." "Action speaks louder than words." and a favorite of mine, "When you do anything in life, be willing to sign your name to it." I guess it all boils down to the fact that most people have no clue when it comes to RESPONSIBILITY.

Thank God there are people like you and I that don't see ourselves as being above others and will continue cleaning up after other's messes. This entitlement, laziness and "that's below me" attitude gets worse every day. Just look at the children of today and tell me I'm wrong. Bless all you parents out there that have figured out a way to override your childrens peers and are able to get it through our childrens heads that we are all equal and it's just flat out WRONG to expect others to take care of their messes.....no matter where or what the mess is. AMEN!

Very good responses. I also like the saying 'talk is cheap...'
I think small group of people are pigs, period. Selfish acts describe them. And majority of people are lethargic, they just don't have a clue! Incompetency describes them at times.
Another small group of people are type A personality, who gets things done and get it done right the first time.

So I am thinking, why not educate the lethargic group and forget about the pigs since they are hopeless. There is handgun safety certificate in order to purchase a handgun. Why not have Backcountry Safety Certificate? Can be done using the web, have a PDF information booklet and a test to obtain the certificate with charge of $15? In order to obtain a wilderness pass, one must present a certificate number which can randomly be checked by issuing office. This for min. adminstrative cost.

I think many of us want to enjoy the nature but don't know how to take care of it so why not educate everyone.

I've left things behind and not realized it until I got home and could not go back for them.

I don't mean to offer that as an excuse for blatant littering, but I do think that if all you saw there was "an old jar of salmon eggs lying among the stones" you might reconsider your conclusion because I also pick up trash others have left behind quite often.

There's something really perplexing about this subject that I noticed a few years back...

When I discover a piece of trash left by someone long ago, it's like finding a little piece of historic treasure and it's a bit of a thrill. I look at it and take time to think about who left it there and what life was like for them.

But I also got upset when I found more recently left trash.

If you're guilty of finding a broken arrowhead, or even an old coke bottle, and being thrilled about it then you need to consider the perplexity of this too because it was really just litter or forgotten when it was abandoned.

So I considered it and concluded that I love feeling that "bit of excitement", but I didn't like feeling "upset", when I found trash on my ramblings in the forests.

Now when I find litter I usually just put it in with my trash and forget about. Then my view is completely pristine and that's what I bring back to keep.

I also usually leave a coin under a small stack of small rocks so I can pass the thrill of discovery along.

Bill do you leave old coins or modern coins? Or maybe a shiny new coin? I'm thinking of old axe heads, steel and stone, old glass bottles etc, more interesting than litter. Its shotgun shells that upset me. But my wife and I have a joke about them and pretend that they're rare finds, especially the super valuable red ones. VERY few hunters or shooters pick up their brass and anybody macho enough to own a shotgun NEVER picks up the cartridges cause you can't even reload them. The same people wouldn't dream of leaving a tire of a sofa, but through their garbage into the fire pit and leave broken glass, generally 50 feet away and near the rock it sat on when they shoot at it.
Some places the law requires leaving the entrails in the water. And I guess I sort of enjoy bagging flies and poppers from my canoe. Walk down a deserted beach and the most interesting thing I found was a red piece of plastic labelled "remove before placing in launcher".
Jim

Hey Bill, I like your analogy of old vs new.

I was out with the Scouts a couple of weekends ago and we went out to an old cemetery to do some clean up. The cemetery was in great condition but there was trash along the road.

We had two groups (a fast group and a slow group) and I was hanging back with the slow group. As we were walking along the road (about 3/4 mile) I kept spotting trash that the fast group had overlooked and soon the boys I was with were also spotting the 'hidden' trash. We filled up three bags. We found lots of new trash and some interesting old trash.
The boys turned it into a game and had a good time.

Tango61

Actually, Jim, shot shell casings can be reloaded. All the guys with whom I hunt pick up their shotgun shell casings and give them to me for reloading, and I pick up all of mine as well. I reload in all gauges except .410. I would agree that shot shell casings can be a blight, particularly in high volume areas, such as a dove field. And they take forever to decompose.

I've left all kinds of coins. I actually started doing this when I was still a teen. One of the first times was when I left a nickle at Disneyland in the rafters above the Wishing Well in front of the Castle while I was there with my girlfriend. I told her we'd look for it the next time we came back and, oh yeah, she gave me a great kiss when I came back down

A year later, to our amazement, it was still there. I put another there the last time I visited the park, over 25 years ago

Since then I've left coins, usually in a stack of small rocks, or maybe in a crevice of a big boulder or cliff face, in at least a dozen States and five Countries.

When the last Susan B Anthony and the new Sacawagea Dollars came out I put quite a few out in forests around here.

I always bring some change with me to leave behind. And, when I'm not alone, I always try to bring enough to give everyone with me a coin to leave when we've hiked someplace unique.

And if I remember, I always leave one at the furthest point I made it on my bushwhacks.

About 10-12 years ago I posted a story about a coin I left in an easy to find spot called The Falls at Hercules Glades. Since then I've gotten emails from dozens of people that were planning to go there and those that had went, all telling me they intended to find that coin.

I've even been there several times since then and heard people talking about the "Story on the Web" and the "Hidden Coin", and watched them looking for it.

Of course, I always put a few more there whenever I visit, and sometimes I even find one or two I didn't put there. It's almost become a local tradition to find or put a coin there now

My career was archaeology, so your trash is my treasure, provided it is olde enough. That doesn't have to be all that old. Archaeologists study WWII, and I have recorded a plane wreck that occurred my junior year in high school.

It is a rather interesting question - When is it old enough to be science, instead of nasty litter?

I considered mounting a bumper sticker reading "Garbage feeds my family," except I think it would not be understood in the proper context. Most of what archaeologists deal with is pretty clearly waste and discard, rather than the King Tut stuff.

Indeed. I find it completely amusing to ponder. Several trails I frequent in the rockies have at one point:

1) a dead and stripped 1978 vintage half ton truck.

2) An abandoned and messed up rock chipper

3) An abandoned D-9 Caterpillar tractor.

All of them I view as basically an eyesore.

For some reason, all of this changes when it's old steam donkey engines abandoned in the early 1900's - why this is I don't know..

If you see some guy lurking behind you with a Minelab metal detector, don't be alarmed....... it's just me.

Great pictures!

I think it becomes interesting when the technology is not familiar...

In the Channel Islands, we get about the same donkey engines aboard late 19th century lumber schooners. Usually they are underwater.....