The Nip Bottle Problem, Part II

Finally; some snow blankets over a frozen Merimere Reservoir.

Visit #1182, Sunday 3 March 19, 11:25AM-12:50PM, 4.2 miles, trash weight not measured.
Temps in the mid-40's; pleasant with sunny skies.

This week is something of a follow-up to last week's report on the nip bottle problem in Meriden, as well as elsewhere in the state. It's more like a REVENUE problem that has a litter problem.

I walked the road around Merimere Reservoir not expecting to find much litter or nip bottles due to the snow cover, and I was right. No matter; I had something else to keep me busy.

The weather was perfect, bringing out brought out many people with their dogs. I met one of them later on.

Enroute to my work site, I found this Carhartt microfleece hat perched on a guardrail.

Someone's loss will be another person's gain: I'll take it home, wash it, and bring it to Goodwill.

At the sharp bend in the road where the climb to the peaks begins, I reached my task for the week.

I wanted to remove the graffiti and I wasn't messing around. I brought the big guns of paint remover, and it was a little too strong.

 It started to remove the sign! A gentler touch prevented any more damage.

At the top of the road I hiked trails down and to the Halfway House, where a snowman stands sentry. "Colt" was such a happy dog, playing with every stick he could find. He wasn't camera-shy either.

As I returned to the parking lot my trash bag had only a few wrappers in it. I thought today would be a bust, until I found a couple cardboard boxes on the Soap Box Derby trail.

I didn't find any nip bottles in Hubbard Park this day. If you'll recall last week, I scoured the roadside near where I live and see many nip bottles, taking inventory as I collected them. But last week there was still some snow on the ground no doubt reducing my haul. Also, I felt bad that I neglected to pick up the other trash along this property. So later on Sunday I returned to the area and picked up ALL the trash, counting the nip bottles I didn't find last week.

Another reason to do this today was 5-9" of snow is forecast overnight and there's no telling when I'd see the ground again.

While I didn't have the means to separate the litter and photograph this week's haul of nip bottles, I CAN give you the following numbers:

I collected and weighed 40lbs. of litter in two bags, of which I calculated 6.4lbs. were nip bottles, or 158 of 'em.

Add that to last week's collection and you have 369. At a future 5 cent deposit per, I could have made $18.45! I wonder how many nip bottles I could buy with that?