My hobby lately is to head out to my favorite home course early, work on my round, break out the plastic shopping bags and clean trash along the way.
I applaud both the post and the effort. This has been the subject of many threads, but you've done it well, grasshopper. This is an excellent first post on a thread, and thanks for cleaning up after others.
the double/multiples - this is a head scratcher for me personally. This is when I am two or three bad shots deep in the woods and find 2 cans of the same brand within 12 inches of each other. Maybe someone was drinking a beer when they threw their disc to this point and decided to slam another when they saw their lie? - don't know. They usually leave nice plastic behind - unmarked and near new.
I've come across this as well, mystifying. Almost like, "well I'm so deep I might as well camp for awhile." I've also thought that in some demented DG party, the guy was deep in there drinking his beer, waiting for his turn because someone else was out, and looking for their disc… "Is it my turn yet? No? Guess I'll have another…"
the responsible litterbug - this is the person who left his/her empty in a spot near the teebox where it can be easily picked up. This act will often prompt others of his/her kind to follow suit - after all, a neatly piled pyramid of aluminum cans in one area look almost as good as if there were none. Perfect place for a trash can but it's expensive to empty a trash can every day for every hole on the course. Downside - sometimes the pyramid isn't so organized or maybe it grows for a week.
Maybe this guy is waiting for recyclers to come by for the aluminum? To save them the trouble of digging through the other trash? Just an optimistic thought…
Brands Found - in order of prevalence:
Keystone Light
Bud Light
Budweiser
Miller Lite
Other 5-10%
Bottles:
Dos XX
I kind of thought Keystone Ice would have won the gold – that's what I find most often.
I do want to get some ideas spurred by the dg community as how to attack this problem. A clean beach campaign in Santa Cruz, CA (Pack your Trash) was started by some surfers many years ago and is now a full on operation. They have made a huge impact - younger generations look down upon littering the beach.
Amen, good ideas, and we should follow their lead.
I think there's a huge opportunity for the PDGA to jump on this as both a cause and a means to clean up that bad DG reputation. They could find a way to offer incentive during play (such as 1 throw for picking up 5 pieces of trash - i.e. mulligan or from total), possibly +1 or +2 for littering. If adopted by clubs this could be a DG tradition that would separate it from other sports and improve it's character. A cleaner course would only be one thing that would come as a result of something like this, but there I go being naively idealistic again.
Not so idealistic, but maybe naïve. We need to take responsibility for this stuff locally: both the cleaning up and the confronting of those choosing to create the problem. The guys doing the littering aren't going to be concerned about scores.
…my ace count still remains at 1 (1993) but I feel great on almost every throw.
Good for you, bro.
King of the Douchebags
This fool wants to show all the other dbags that purposely litter that he is far more committed to the cause then they. To do this he flexes his power and makes his territory by kicking over a filled trashcan. Because it is far more impressive and time-effective to empty a trash can on the ground than to produce your own garbage for individual littering.
I've had this same experience at our local park – no disc golf – but, still. These guys tied a dumpster to the back of their pickup truck and dragged it around the park, spilling garbage from the dumpster all over and marring the park with tire tracks and dead grass everywhere. The dumpster was left in the middle of the park. Boy you guys are really cool.
...its the glass bottles that really get to me. I play barefoot for most of the summer (nothing feels better than grass under your feet) but people usually take the extra effort to break their glass bottles on the course (nothing feels worse than glass under your feet). It has gotten so bad that I fear the course may get closed soon.
Amen to this. I don't play barefoot anymore, but broken glass on the course is just so bad. Again, if it makes you feel cool to break a bottle, break it in your own living room, not where people are playing golf or walking their dogs.
How about contacting someone to see if you could try and drum up some support for a course clean up day. If you get enough of the local DGers to take some pride in the course then it might stay clean after
Yeah, local course and area clubs often take this up. Run with this!
…just want to nominate this rant as best I read of the year.
Seconded.
i live in texas where people have no taste and being cultured or thinking outside the box is gay so id say 99% of are trash is bud light (busch light same diff.) and malboro lights, if your gonna use something thats bad for you at least use something thats enjoyable to the senses not just a means of getting drugs in your system.
Just for nostalgia's sake, and once again: what the?