Shooting down litter problem at popular recreation area
<p>“The shooting range” by Hayden Creek is littered with shell casings. Gerry Ross makes a point to pick up after himself whenever he comes here, but wished others would do the same.</p>
<p>From left to right, Shoshana Cooper, Brian Bunch, Dale Bunch and Bob Balser leave one of the Hayden Creek areas that has been trashed and damaged. A lot of the trees have been shot down and only remain as stumps and paper plates, cigarettes and shell casings litter the ground. These four have been working together for the past five years to keep this area clean.</p>
<p>Bob Balser and Shoshana Cooper explore “the shooting range” near Hayden Creek where people have been leaving lots of trash and big gouges in the roads. Balser has been working withe the U.S. Forest Service for five years to clean up the area.</p>
Five years ago a pullout by Hayden Creek was scattered with refrigerators, microwaves and even a dishwasher - all riddled with bullet holes. The U.S. Forest Service was considering shutting the area down, but Bob Balser did not want to see that happen.
Ohio Match Road turns into a Forest Service Road that goes to the Hayden Creek area. The area is an access point for the Coeur d’Alene National Forest and people go there for its beautiful scenery.
The drive along Forest Service Road 437 is slow going due to all the pot holes and craters made by people driving too fast or through the mud. Pockets of small clearings line the road, most are filled with trash and some of the trees have been shot down.
For the past five years, Balser has been working to clean up the area. There is one spot in particular that people call “the shooting range” that Balser is most passionate about.
“I don’t want people to leave a damn thing here other than tracks,” he said. “That includes cigarette butts, anything. If you bring it, take it.”
Further up the road, there are a few more areas where people have been shooting guns. Brian Bunch and his dad, Dale Bunch, have focused their efforts on cleaning up that area. They found out Balser was also making an effort to better that area and teamed up with him.
Balser and the Bunch father and son have been at it for five years. They joined forces and now recruit volunteers every year to help clean up the two areas.
The Hayden Creek clean up will be this Saturday, May 21. Balser and Brian Bunch want to get as many volunteers as they can.
The group will meet at Super 1 Foods in Hayden at 8 a.m. Saturday before heading out to Hayden Creek.
“The volunteers really have made an impact,” Bunch said. “I know it looks bad with the trees, but there used to be TVs and fridges. Now it’s a different culture. People come and see a place that’s clean and they feel bad about leaving trash in a clean place.”
Idaho Panhandle National Forests Public Information Officer Shoshana Cooper said the Forest Service wants to keep the non-designated shooting areas available for recreation.
“We want to keep it open,” Cooper said. “But if the damage and the trash keep happening to it, we will have to look at closing it because it becomes a health and safety issue as well as significantly damaging natural resources.”
When people use trees for targets, the trees’ structures weaken and eventually the trees fall down, usually with the help of a wind storm.
One year, Brian Bunch cut down the tall standing stumps left by the fallen trees. That didn’t help though, because people just continued to shoot at the next line of trees.
“If you remove the tree, cut the stumps down, they no longer have a target so they move on to something else,” he said. “We leave the dead tree stumps as targets so people don’t shoot the live trees. It’s kind of sad.”
Not only has Balser been cleaning up the area with volunteers and on his own, but he has put signs up, given to him by the Forest Service, against leaving trash.
Every time he puts one up, it only takes a couple days before they’re gone. Two were shot down and one completely disappeared.
“We don’t have enough money to replace signs every time they are taken down,” Cooper said. “I’d rather spend that money on fixing these roads than on more signs.”
Gerry Ross has been going to “the shooting range” for a while now and always cleans up the things he brought.
He uses biodegradable clays and makes sure his friends respect the area as much as he does.
“I was taught to clean everything up,” he said. “You have to try to make a conscious effort. This is God’s earth. It’s beautiful and I don’t want to trash it.”
As Cooper and Balser walked around “the shooting range,” they pointed out paper targets pinned to trees, big gouges in the ground full of water from people driving irresponsibly and big pieces of trash that stood out from all the smaller pieces.
“There’s a natural integrity of being out in the woods and when you are looking at someone’s trash pile or heap, that’s disheartening,” Cooper said. “This is peoples’ public land and a lot of them that see this are horrified by it. The more awareness about this and the more we talk about it, the more responsible people become for the area.”
“Eighty, maybe 90 percent of the people want it cleaned up,” Balser agreed. “It’s just that handful of jerks that screw it up for everybody.”
For more information about the Hayden Creek clean up effort, call Brian Bunch at (208)-659-5014.