Step 2

 Changing My Ways

When I fly-fish I always seem so focused on catching a fish, which seems pretty normal to me. Almost every time that I go fishing, I lose lines in trees, and sometimes even leave trash behind at the multiple sites that I cast at. As Bob Dylan once wrote ” Times are a changing”, and the times has come to get off my lazy bum and start picking up after myself in order to keep the fishing areas around my sustainable (Delaware, Lehigh and Bushkill). In the past two weeks a friend and I have started the Lafayette Fly-Fishing Club and while mapping out what we needed to move on, I proposed a cleanup crew for after every venture out, or to even appoint someone on our board as our environmental activist. I seem to leave trash and dead-line behind when I am more focused on the fishing than the environment. I can’t say that I am any different than any other fisherman in that way. Sometimes, I prefer to fish alone, and this is when in the past I have gotten lazy and left multiple things behind on the riverbanks. A way to end this would be to bring a trashbag with me each time I go fishing and reminding my fellow fisherman to do the same and clean up after themselves.

 

Though I did not find any real websites or databases addressing why people decide to litter in our rivers and streams, I did find the national organization in charge of river cleanups. Things that determine why rivers are not so sustainable, is the fact that most americans live within a mile of a stream or river (AARP 2013), and they don’t realize that littering near a stream, can have the same effect as throwing trash directly into a stream. A barrier in the way of my sustainable action, is the fact that people do not know that millions of tons of trash end up in our nations rivers and streams every year(AARP 2013). Also, that the population density of areas near water-systems is very high, which in affect causes more opportunity for more people who litter to damage these water-systems. Till next time, I can only hope to get better at casting so I don’t leave as much excess lines behind, or encourage people including myself, to not only enjoy the fishing, but enjoy keeping the rivers and streams clean and pristine.

http://www.handsonnetwork.org/files/resources/rivercleanup.pdf