Little Things Maintenance

Mr. Bumblebee approves of the new lock at the Merimere Reservoir gate.

Visit #1017, Saturday 4 June 16, 5:45-7:50PM, 4.7 miles.

Temps in the 80's, humid and clouding up in advance of Sunday's forecast rain.

After the last couple weeks' big ticket projects, I got a break and some down time where I could attend to some detail work on the trails.

I hiked a counterclockwise loop of the lower trails, starting at the Soap Box Derby Track.

I didn't walk more than a hundred feet when I scored a  "freebie":

But nearby I found an opened condom wrapper.

What bothers me is finding both items so close to areas with a lot of pedestrian traffic. I hope this isn't a trend or a general change in human behavior. This is a park, not the backseat of a car.

Onward to the trail behind the water tank to address some foliage which was encroaching into the trail.

I trimmed the branches back with a pair of loppers and generally pruned this section of trail.

On to the Main Trail where I found more encroachment.

Next on the list was some graffiti at the Halfway House which I'd long forgotten about. I didn't cover all of it; maybe next week.

 

Just a few yards away on the  Main Trail was my next small project, this hanging vine.

  

Further on, I came upon another possible troubling trend like the condom wrappers.

I started finding bent trees on the trail side like the one above, as far back as October 2012.

Here are just a few more obvious examples:

October 2012:

May 2015:

August 2015:

This is being done deliberately and maliciously.

I found another bent tree later on. I plan on removing both next week.

I returned to the park and dropped off my trash for the week.