By Jill Sperling

Kamloops Naturalist Club hope to find less trash during third annual grasslands cleanup

Apr 6, 2018 | 4:33 PM

KAMLOOPS — It’s a natural gem just west of Kamloops, the scenic grasslands above Cooney Bay. 

The region is beautiful and serene, but over the past two years tens of thousands of pounds of trash has been collected from the Dewdrop Range. 

A vacuum cleaner, an old rug, and plenty of garbage was visible on Friday, illegally dumped in the protected grasslands. 

“There’s still a lot of people out there that just use the outdoors as a big dumping ground,” said Kamloops Naturalist Club Vice President Frank Ritcey. 

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Every spring the Kamloops Naturalist Club leads a crew of volunteers on a mission to clean up the tons of trash that clutter up the Dewdrop. 

The third annual Grasslands Cleanup will take place on Sunday. 

“It’s really disheartening that after two years of cleaning this place up we still have lots of garbage,” Ritcey said. “Hopefully this year we’re going to come back with only 500 pounds, which sounds like a lot, but in the past two years we’ve collected about 40,000 pounds of garbage off of there.” 

The cleanup crew, which ranges between 140-150 people and includes members of the Kamloops 4×4 Club, the Kamloops Fish and Game Club, and various hiking groups has never failed to find some interesting items dumped where they don’t belong. 

“We find everything out there, from couches to TV sets, I even found the slate table from a pool table,” Ritcey said. “That thing has to weigh 200 pounds, somebody drug out there to dump out, and all types of building material. At some point you think it’s got to be cheaper just to go to the dump and pay the tipping fee.”

Garbage isn’t the only concern in the Dewdrop Range. Most of the area is off-limits to off-road vehicles. 

“It’s very clear as to where you can and can’t drive,” Ritcey said. “But there’s still people who go out and rip up the grasslands, and unfortunately those types of scars take hundreds of years to heal, it’s very sensitive soil out there. It’s really important that we raise awareness as well as clean the place up.”

Ritcey promises the cleanup isn’t going to be all work. Volunteers will be rewarded with a barbecue lunch and a hike overlooking Kamloops Lake.

The cleanup begins at 9 a.m. Sunday, and directions to the meeting site are available on the Kamloops Naturalist Club’s Facebook page.