This story was previously published on GuelphToday.
A local dog and his pet parents are on a mission to keep Guelph trails clean this year, and are hoping others will join the cause.
If you've been on a Guelph trail lately, you might have seen Jasper, a three-year-old, 114-pound great Bernese, toting a bag of garbage alongside his owners, Lisa Hearn and Gabriel Navarrete.
The pair set a goal to clean up any garbage they come across on their walks every single day this year, with Jasper's help.
“Jasper is really our motivator to get out there,” Hearn said. “It’s really terrible finding garbage all over the trails, especially garbage that could potentially hurt a dog,” like glass bottles that could shatter, for instance.
Mostly though, they find a lot of coffee cups, pop cans and poop bags, she said.
They’re focusing on public trails around Guelph as well as their neighbourhood near Stone Road Mall, but they plan to clean up conservation area trails in Cambridge and Kitchener sometimes too.
They typically take Jasper out several times a day, so it shouldn't be too hard to keep up. But it was on these walks that they initially started noticing the amount of garbage left on Guelph trails.
“We’re always commenting (on it), but not necessarily prepared to pick up garbage,” Navarrete said. “So we just decided, you know what, let’s stop complaining about it and go prepared so that we can actually do something about it.”
“And then it spiralled a little bit, and now we’ve decided to try to motivate others to clean up the neighbourhood. Why not do that while you’re out walking your dog?” Hearn said.
Their daily findings are documented on Jasper’s Instagram to encourage others to get on board. The posts will be from Jasper’s perspective, “because people can relate a little bit more to animals,” she said.
He’s not only along for the ride though.
“Right now he does carry out the garbage bags, but (they’re) crashing into his leg, so it’s not ideal. So I’m going to make him a specialized harness with garbage bags on the side, with aluminum posts that keep it away from him,” Navarrete said.
“He loves jobs, so he’s fully into it. He’s started chasing plastic bottles,” Hearn said.
While they started with the intent to encourage dog walkers in Guelph, it’s grown to anyone who enjoys nature and regularly hits the trails. They’ve launched a Facebook group for people to share their own posts and point out areas that are in need of a clean up, and are encouraging people to do the same on Instagram.
“Pick up some litter, take a picture and post it with the hashtag #cleanupyourpath to continue to inspire the concept to grow” Navarrete said.
There are about 30 people in the group so far, though they hope it will continue to grow.
According to Hearn, Starkey Hill and the Guelph Radial Trail are especially in need of a good clean up. She said the parking lots of public trails are typically "an absolute disaster" as well, and Navarrete added that it's almost worse on side trails away from the main paths.
“A little bit more obscure paths, people are more inclined to think it’s ok to throw their trash there, because it’s not as (visible)," he said.
“If we do find a really bad spot and we can’t clean it all up or we know we have to go back another day to make a bigger dent in it, we’re going to try to tell other people,” who want to help, Hearn said.
Navarrete said they hope eventually they won’t find any litter on their walks because of their regular clean ups, and other people getting involved.
While they hope the idea of cleaning up on walks catches on, they’re also hoping raising awareness about their endeavour will make people think twice about littering in the first place.
