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The Great Tire Cleanup has begun! |
I got tired of looking at all the tires on the bottom of the Nashwaak River near where it meets the Saint John River this year, and decided to do something about it.
 This is one I should have gotten this spring, before I became inspired. It's on the north branch of the Rusagonis River. |
I officially began the cleanup on October 4, 2003. My brother Paul and I were paddling on Cane Creek, an arm of the mouth that comes in from Marysville, where it runs below the Nashwaak walking trail. We just happened to have some oversized garbage bags with us, and when I spied the old whitewall perched on the bank just above the waterline, I knew it would be the first.
We maneuvered the boat parallel to the shore. I then picked up one side of the tire and rocked it up and down on the far side to slosh the muck and water out of it, well as much as I could. I then slipped the oversize garbage bag over it, flipped it up and laid it gently into the boat. I kept the open end of the bag up so it didn’t slop gunk onto the floor.
 The very first tire of the great Nashwaak Tire Cleanup |
I didn’t have my camera with me, I had left it in the car. So after loading the tire into the back of the car and driving it home with me, I perched the tire up in the backyard so you can see the first tire of the Great Nashwaak Tire Cleanup.
The acid test came the next morning. I placed the tire, inside the garbage bag, at the curb for the regular weekly garbage pickup. And lo and behold, when I came home that night, the tire was gone.
Let’s hope it actually made it out to the tire recycling plant in Minto. I still hope to organize a team cleanup for the Nashwaak next September. All we need is a guarantee that the tires will be picked up and managed responsibly. I’m sure I can get that.
Why don’t we make it an international tire cleanup? Send me a photo of any tire you haul out of your home river, and e-mail it to me at kencorbett@lycos.com. Let me know your name (or your handle), the date you hauled it out for disposal or recycling, and the name of the river you helped clean. Feel free to pose beside your tire. I’ll post it at Bravehost, and your fellow river recreationists will know that you are a steward of your home rivers.
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