#litter | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

rebeccathenaturalist · 4 months

Text

Welcome to my Tuesday morning PSA about plastics!

So--I was walking along the Bolstadt beach approach sidewalk here in Long Beach, WA yesterday afternoon, and I started seeing these little orange pellets on the ground that looked a little bit like salmon roe (but probably weren't). So I picked one up, and it was most definitely rubber. I went around picking up every one I could find, and while I didn't keep exact count I probably amassed 50-60 of them. I took this picture before depositing them in the nearest trash can.

These are airsoft gun pellets, and you can buy them in big jars containing thousands of them. That means that someone who decided that the beach was a great place to shoot their airsoft guns could easily litter the place with countless little bits of plastic rubber in less than an hour. We already have a huge problem here with people leaving trash, including tiny bits of plastic, all over the beach (you should see the gigantic mess after 4th of July fireworks when thousands of people come in from out of town, blow things up, and then leave again without picking up after themselves.)

But these airsoft pellets have a particularly nasty side effect. You know how my first thought was "wow, those look kind of like salmon roe?" Well, we have a number of opportunistic omnivore birds like crows, ravens, and several species of gull that commonly scavenge on the beach, especially along the approaches because people often feed them there. If I can catch the resemblance of an orange airsoft pellet to a fish egg, then chances are there are wildlife that will assume they're edible.

Since birds don't chew their food, they probably won't notice that the taste or texture is wrong--it'll just go down the hatch. And since they can't digest the pellets, there's a good chance they might just build up in the bird's digestive system, especially if the bird eats a large number of them--say, fifty or sixty of them dropped on the ground along the same fifty foot stretch of sidewalk. The bird might die of starvation if there's not enough capacity for food in their stomach--or they might just die painfully of an impacted gut, and no way to get help for it. If the pellets end up washed into the ocean, you get the same issue with fish and other marine wildlife eating them, and then of course the pellets eventually breaking up into microplastic particles.

You can get biodegradable airsoft pellets; they appear to mainly be gray or white in color rather than bright screaming orange and green. But "biodegradable" doesn't mean "instantly dissolves the next time it rains." An Amazon listing for Aim Green biodegradable airsoft pellets advertise them as "Our biodegradable BBs are engineered to degrade only with long-term exposure to water and sun and will degrade 180 days after being used." That's half a year for them to be eaten by wildlife.

I don't know, y'all. That handful of carelessly dropped rubber pellets just encapsulates how much people don't factor in the rest of nature when making decisions, even on something that is purely for entertainment like an airsoft gun. We could have had a lot of the same technological advances we have today, but with much less environmental impact, if we had considered the long-term effects on both other people and other living beings, as well as our habitats. We could have found ways from the beginning to make these things in ways that benefited us but also mitigated any harm as much as possible. Instead we're now having to reverse-engineer things we've been using for decades, and sometimes--like the "biodegradable" airsoft pellets--they still have a significant negative impact.

But--at least there are people trying to do things better, thinking ahead instead of just on immediate profit. We're stuck in a heck of a mess here, figuratively and literally, and changing an entire system can't be done in a day. Maybe we can at least keep pushing for a cultural shift that emphasizes planning far into the future--if not the often-cited "seven generations ahead", then at least throughout the potential lifespan of a given product.

4K notes · View notes

jacky93sims · 23 days

Text

Nature's Kitty Litter for The Sims 2

This is a 4to2 conversion from K9DB, low poly. It's a functional litter for cats that can be put in the garden and can be cleaned by your sims as usual. I also added an "Infinite" version where the litter is always clean with no smells or flies. This version is SLAVED to the main one and you can have both in your game.

DOWNLOAD HERE

-------------------------------

If you want to support my creations, you can send me a donation with Paypal or Ko-fi ☕ If you want to ask for a Paid Commission, HERE you can find more details. Thank you <3

#the sims 2 #ts2 #sims 2 cc #sims 2 download #the sims 2 cc #ts2 download #4to2 #4to2 conversion #buy mode #sims 2 pets #pets #cat litter #litter #cats #kitten

283 notes · View notes

literal-bot-account · 1 year

Text

picking up litter is worth it!!

individual environmentalism gets a lot of flak in the face of corporate pollution but picking up litter makes a significant, noticeable impact. I spend about an hour a week picking up litter from around my dorm complex and I'm literally outpacing my community's litter production. Just an hour a week from one person is enough to offset nearly 200 people's worth of littering.

it would take less than 100 man-hours of labor per week to keep my whole college campus entirely litter-free. If you got two classrooms' worth of people to spend two hours per week each picking up litter, the whole campus would end up spotless and they'd straight up fucking run out of things to pick up.

If you're looking for some way to make a noticeable and positive impact on the world around you, go pick up some litter.

#litter collecting #litter picking #solarpunk #ecopunk #environment #environmentalism #litter #cry havoc

2K notes · View notes

reasonsforhope · 3 months

Text

"After a year of the statewide fee on single-use plastic bags, the Eco-Cycle recycling center in Boulder estimates between 1.5 billion and 1.8 billion fewer plastic bags were used in Colorado in 2023.

The center anticipates a greater reduction in use in 2024 as businesses phase out the use of single-use plastic bags in most cases.

Eco-Cycle calculated its estimate by taking the number of plastic bags each American uses per year on average — 365, according to National Geographic— and factoring Colorado’s population, along with reduction estimates from several local communities.

Randy Moorman, Eco-Cycle’s director of policy and community campaigns, said the reduction is crucial because single-use plastic bags are the number one contaminant found in Colorado’s rivers and streams. They also are not able to be fully recycled and instead have to be “down-cycled” into other products...

Businesses in Colorado have until June to use whatever single-use plastic bags they already have while still collecting the 10-cent fee. The collected fees are divided between the business and the local government to fund green initiatives. Denver, for example, has collected $5 million for its special revenue fund since its fee was implemented in 2021.

Becky Goyton, an education coordinator with Denver’s Office of Climate Action, Sustainability, and Resiliency, said the money has funded many environmental initiatives, including the purchase of reusable bags for residents and sustainable products for small businesses. Unlike most budgetary matters, Goyton celebrates the decline in revenue to the fund.

“Having some revenue to do some great projects and reinvest in the community is wonderful, but it’s not our goal,” Goyton said. “Our goal is to see that fee go down and that revenue go down because that means more people are bringing their own bag and less disposable bags are being put out into the community.”

In addition to single-use plastic bags, Colorado businesses are also required to phase out Styrofoam containers this year. Like with plastic bags, businesses are permitted to use already-purchased Styrofoam products but cannot obtain any more."

-via ABC Denver7, January 11, 2024

--

And further progress just kicked in at the beginning of this year:

"[On January 1, 2024], the next phase of Colorado's plastic bag ban takes effect. The next step for HB21-1162 is that stores will no longer have plastic bags at all. They will only offer recyclable paper bags which will still be 10 cents each. Stores that already have stock of plastic bags already, can use those up before making the transition...

Businesses that don't comply can face up to $500 in fines for a second violation and up to $1,000 in fines for a third and subsequent violation."

-via ABC Denver 7, December 25, 2023

#colorado #denver #united states #plastic bags #plastic bag ban #styrofoam #environmentalism #litter #pollution #local government #us politics #good news #hope #environment #sustainability

189 notes · View notes

hometoursandotherstuff · 11 months

Photo

#ecology #waste #litter #other stuff #environment

408 notes · View notes

vintagepromotions · 1 year

Photo

‘Don’t leave litter’

British Ministry of Housing and Local Government poster reminding the public not to litter, featuring a toy knight on a rocking horse spearing rubbish (1968). Artwork by Andre Amstutz.

#vintage poster #1960s #Andre Amstutz #british #litter #littering #rubbish #knight #rocking horse #public announcements

1K notes · View notes

strangebiology · 8 months

Text

Any guesses why I always find carcasses in trash piles?

In VA I found some dead dogs in an illegal dump, which was suspicious, and in CA I found a deer with its head cut clean off and none of the other meat taken, at the same Borax lake where I found a lot of trash. So in those cases I suspect foul play. But otherwise?

#dead animals #vulture culture #bones #skulls #litter #environment #trash #graphic #animal death

214 notes · View notes

a-titty-ninja · 7 months

Text

#goddess of victory: nikke #nikke #勝利の女神:nikke #litter #anime #mygif #mygif:goddess of victory

160 notes · View notes

adorkabletwilightandfriends · 1 month

Text

Adorkable Twilight & Friends - “Not As She Appears"

Adorkable Patreon Pals

Adorkable Twilight & Friends Twitter

Adorkable Twilight & Friends Wiki

Adorkable Twilight & Friends Deviant Art

86 notes · View notes

oasisr · 8 months

Text

Littering is so degenerate.

#litter #littering #degenerate #environment #environmentalism

151 notes · View notes

wojakgallery · 16 days

Text

Title/Name: Cat Litter Brainlet Wojak Series: Brainlet (Variant), Animal (Variant) Image submission by: hellsite-yano on Tumblr Image by: Unknown Main Tag: Brainlet Wojak

#Wojak #Brainlet #Brainlet Wojak #hellsite-yano #Brainlet Series #Animal #Animal Wojak #Animal Series #Cat Wojak #Litter #Litter Brainlet #Litter Brain #White #Gray #Cat

50 notes · View notes

viejospellejos · 8 months

Text

Su coche es una basura