Climbing Ben Nevis
Ben Nevis, the highest mountain in the British Isles, sees over 20,000 walkers a month.
The journey to the top of the 1,344m mountain is not so much a treacherous one, than a long one. The average person takes 8 hours to complete the challenge but on the way they will be enjoying the awesome views of lochs and rolling hills.
However, they can also enjoy picnics and high-sugar snacks to keep them going. With no bins or facilities on the way up it can be less hassle to drop sweetie wrappers or tissues than to replace them in the over-packed backpack.
Conscientious walkers will pick up left rubbish on their way back down, trying to clear the mountain of non-biodegradable material, but sometimes there can be just too much left up there.
Four times a year, volunteers and conservation officers make the journey to the top, with a bag and a rubbish picker, collecting all the junk left behind.
Over 50 volunteers recently completed a pick on the last May bank holiday 28th, each filling a large black bag.
The purpose of the walk was not just to collect rubbish, but also to educate people about the products that they may not even realize take years to degrade at such high altitudes; including banana skins and apple cores.
At lower temperatures these items will get turned to mulch quickly, as anyone who has a compost bin will know, but at high altitudes they cannot degrade as easily and can be left untouched for years.
The same is true of human waste; not having any toilets does not stop walkers from taking a pit-stop behind a boulder. But, not only is it a sight that others don’t want to see, it is also causing a chemical imbalance in the soil.
Littering is illegal in Scotland and is punishable by a £50 fine; however, with no CCTV or patrols who can really enforce this rule?
It is not good enough to just rely on these volunteers to bring back the rubbish. Individuals need to take responsibility themselves and bring down whatever they carried up.
Respecting the land is not hard to do, or too time consuming, but it can make a large difference to other visitors and nature itself.
I completely agree - it astounds me that people think it is okay to just throw rubbish anywhere they like. I cannot imagine how they justify it in their heads. I can't help wondering what they would think if we went to their homes and started dropping rubbish all over their gardens. I had no idea that those things that are biodegradable take so long to degrade in high altitudes.
I climbed Ben Nevis the week before the May Bank Holiday litterpick and was amazed by the amount of litter strewn about the Tourist Route. I asked several people, increasingly with less politeness, to take their rubbish with them and I am happy to say not one of our party of nine left anything more than footprints (and a fair amount of sweat) on the mountain.
Absolutely! It still outrages me every time I see someone drop litter on the street. A couple of weeks ago I saw a woman just chuck her empty drinks can over her shoulder in Holland Park. I was so angry, I picked it up and almost threw it at her, instead holding my anger in check and placing it a bin just a few yards from where she stood. When I asked her why she'd done that, she just shrugged and walked away, grrrrr!
It has been too long! Foolish of me really - life is busy!
On my way down I saw someone drop a plastic sandwich container, my friends and I picked it up and asked why he did that - and he said out of habit!! What a sad state of affairs if it is your natural habit to drop litter!
Nice to hear from you again @funnyale it's been too long! Sounds like a worthwhile piece of work, 50 bags of rubbish - so sad that people can treat our landmarks in this way, thank goodness we have volunteers willing to pick up the mess!