LNT How far do you go?

[Pedaling Fool]

...therefore if you truely want LNT, follow rambunny's advice...it is the only correct answer.

geek

Ok, I don't want LNT.

pack your damm egg shells out please.

Sorry, but I'm one of those hikers that you're going to have to follow around

[blitz1]

this may be verging on TMI, but I belong to the school that believes you usually don't need TP - leaves should work fine unless you're having some GI upset, or it's winter and there are no good leaves. I like oak because they're pretty tough, but most broad leaves work well. no, I'm actually not joking - try it (just don't use poison ivy leaves pls)

[chrisoc]

Poison ivy TP could be a pain in the butt

[Trailbender]

this may be verging on TMI, but I belong to the school that believes you usually don't need TP - leaves should work fine unless you're having some GI upset, or it's winter and there are no good leaves. I like oak because they're pretty tough, but most broad leaves work well. no, I'm actually not joking - try it (just don't use poison ivy leaves pls)

I have, leaves work better wet, and that moss is pretty good too.

[chrisoc]

It looks like we run the gamut from, to hell with LNT, to packing out used TP. I can understand the concept of trying to preserve the image of a pristine wilderness, but put used TP, a serious bio-hazard in the same pack with my food? No way!

BTW: Are there really people who pack out their poop?

[weary]

I think it takes about two to three years for the sunflower seeds and other shells to deteriorate, same as cigarette butts, so if you feel comfy spitting them out, you fall into the same category as people who toss their cigarette butts on the trail. Congrats on packing out the toilet paper. Go all the way with the LNT. There seem to be a ton of people on the AT might as well leave it as you found it for them. I do admit to hucking apple cores in the past, but now I only eat about 1 a year so I just would choose not to eat one instead of dealing with the trash. ....

Filter cigaret butts are made with artificial materials that take centuries to decay. Sunflower seeds are a natural substance, that quickly blend in with the twigs, branches, and the natural soil. There is no resemblance between the two substances.

[WingedMonkey]

BTW: Are there really people who pack out their poop?

You packed it in didn't ya?

[weary]

By following that line of logic I shouldn't compost banana peels, orange peels, watermelon rinds...actually most of the stuff I compost I shouldn't, because it's not native to this area. Look thru your produce section of your grocery store and try and pick out what's native and what's not; wouldn't be much left for you to take home if you only picked the native stuff.

What happens in my compost pile is nothing different than what happens in the compost of a wilderness floor, such as found along the AT. I think people get confused about this issue and the issue of invasive organisms.

Compost piles differ from trash left on trails. Everything organic goes into my compost at home, even occasional newspapers. But I pack out orange peels because if I leave them on the trail, they will remain as a visual blight on the trail for months, sometimes years. Banana peels I tend to hide under rocks or logs.

I could do the same with orange peels, except I've seen them as litter so many times that I can't bring myself to do so.

[ScrapIron]

I just leave my trash in the shelters. I figure some do-gooder will pack it out for me or the rats will turn the edible stuff into compost pretty quickly.

[mweinstone]

Filter cigaret butts are made with artificial materials that take centuries to decay. Sunflower seeds are a natural substance, that quickly blend in with the twigs, branches, and the natural soil. There is no resemblance between the two substances.

they both are not from there
they both were dropped by hikers
they both stick out to the eye as forign and interupt the continuity of the asthetics
they both get picked up by a pissed matthewski
they both represent a missinturpretation of lnt
they both make you look bad throwing them down to some folks if you care
they both are violations of written law and the code of the modern lnt hiker
dont make me continue. i could.

[Pedaling Fool]

Compost piles differ from trash left on trails. Everything organic goes into my compost at home, even occasional newspapers. But I pack out orange peels because if I leave them on the trail, they will remain as a visual blight on the trail for months, sometimes years. Banana peels I tend to hide under rocks or logs.

I could do the same with orange peels, except I've seen them as litter so many times that I can't bring myself to do so.

I admit I don't like to leave food trash out in the open in the woods, only because it's just a little ugly. So I also place stuff like banana peels, orange peels.... under the leave litter. But these things on the open ground does nothing to harm nature in the least (seems to me by your posts you would agree with that), but like I said, understand the aesthetic issue and so I put it under leaf litter.

As for a comparison between my compost pile and a healthy forest floor. That would be interesting if we could do an organism-by-organism comparison. I can't do that, but I can say that microbes, whether here or there, are our trashmen and orange peels or whatever will be devoured and converted into food for plants.

To me, the thought of throwing foodstuff in the trash to be transported to a landfill is just too offensive.

So, that's why I'll leave LNT to the rest of you'll and will continue to feed the microbes.

[The Counselor]

I hover above the trail, never leaving so much as a footprint in the detritus.

[mweinstone]

if i stay home and hike vicariously thru miss janet, am i leaveing any kind of resenence traces in the time space continuim? like thaught tracks or imagination trails? and arent the tiny etched notches in my memory chains of my "brain", unatural? i mean they wouldnt be all notched up. and where do the notched out bits fall? thats right, on the ground. every time you think.

[cavediver256]

LNT??? Has anyone noticed that 2,175 mile path carved into the surface of the earth from GA to Maine??? What about the "white blazes" every few hundred feet in both damn directions???? Those nifty little 3 walled huts every 2-4 miles apart come to mind as well. I guess all that stuff just shot the whole LNT concept all to hell !!!!

If you have set one foot on that trail, you have made some type of impact. I think the key here is to have as minimal an impact as possible. Hike out your trash, bury or hike out your poop and TP, but please don't tell me you are a hiker and you believe for one second you are truly leaving NO trace.

[weary]

I just leave my trash in the shelters. I figure some do-gooder will pack it out for me or the rats will turn the edible stuff into compost pretty quickly.

That comment is not useful. Nor is it funny. Nor does it help with an increasingly serious problem.

[weary]

LNT??? Has anyone noticed that 2,175 mile path carved into the surface of the earth from GA to Maine??? What about the "white blazes" every few hundred feet in both damn directions???? Those nifty little 3 walled huts every 2-4 miles apart come to mind as well. I guess all that stuff just shot the whole LNT concept all to hell !!!!

If you have set one foot on that trail, you have made some type of impact. I think the key here is to have as minimal an impact as possible. Hike out your trash, bury or hike out your poop and TP, but please don't tell me you are a hiker and you believe for one second you are truly leaving NO trace.

I pretty much agree. Which is why I've argued in favor of abandoning LNT and substituting the old "Carry In, Carry out." Carry In, Carry Out, doesn't solve the entire problem. But LNT, though it theoretically would solve all litter problems, in fact, being unrealistic to any sensible human minds, solves none of them.

[Pedaling Fool]

This is what LNT leads to: http://humanitariannews.org/20110413...-rights-humans

UN Document Would Give 'Mother Earth' Same Rights as Humans

13 April, 2011 - 17:51


UNITED NATIONS — Bolivia will this month table a draft United Nations treaty giving "Mother Earth" the same rights as humans — having just passed a domestic law that does the same for bugs, trees and all other natural things in the South American country.

The bid aims to have the UN recognize the Earth as a living entity that humans have sought to "dominate and exploit" — to the point that the "well-being and existence of many beings" is now threatened.




They are creating A New Religion. If you read history and look at how people reacted to certain calamities and natural disasters and how they would do the craziest things IOT please the gods. There is absolutely no difference here and we fool ourselves by referencing science here and there, but it ain't science -- it is a religious belief.

Freakin' 'Mother Earth' How is that not a religion

[ScrapIron]

That comment is not useful. Nor is it funny. Nor does it help with an increasingly serious problem.

Awwww shucks. I'm crushed that you did not find my little comment to be funny....or helpful...or useful.

I live to make you happy.

[Pedaling Fool]

I pretty much agree. Which is why I've argued in favor of abandoning LNT and substituting the old "Carry In, Carry out." Carry In, Carry Out, doesn't solve the entire problem. But LNT, though it theoretically would solve all litter problems, in fact, being unrealistic to any sensible human minds, solves none of them.

Then you shouldn't leave your banana peels http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pack_it_in,_pack_it_out

Excerpt:
....The idea is to remove all forms of litter and biodegradable waste from the natural area for proper disposal so that the materials will cause no harm to the natural resources of the ecosystem. ...


BTW, what is "proper disposal" of biodegradable waste.

Seriously why is it ok to leave your **** and TP in the woods, but not egg shells, coffee grounds, orange peels.... Is it to maintain the delicate balance of nature

[ScrapIron]

I have started to feel very guilty about leaving a couple of peanut shells in the vicinity of Big Bald. I'm taking the rest of the day off to head up there to find them and haul them back out, lest the ecosystem in the area be irreparably damaged.
I am praying for forgiveness from the WB LNT Gods as well as making a sizable donation to the ATC in an effort to assuage the guilt which plagues me so.