Organizers hope to entice lake cleanup volunteers with scavenger hunt

Local officials are adding a scavenger trash hunt to Saturday's cleanup day on Grand Lake to boost participation in the annual event.

Abbey Tobe, coordinator of the Grand Lake/Wabash Watershed Alliance, is organizing the hunt. The lake cleanup is sponsored by the local state park with trash pickup sites on the West Bank in Celina, East Bank in St. Marys and Windy Point in Montezuma.

Tobe worked at the West Bank site last year and was ready to hand out gloves and bags to eager volunteers to gather trash. No one showed up.

"The scavenger hunt is to get people there but what they find will hopefully put the 'wow' factor in it," Tobe said, adding some rather strange items have been found in the past including grills, tires and even large appliances.

Some of the items she plans to include on the scavenger hunt list include straws, fast food containers, beverage containers, cigarette butts, fishing-related items and perhaps a tire. She had not finalized the list of roughly 15 items as of Wednesday morning.

Tobe said organizers don't want volunteers to stop once they get all the items on the list.

"We are going to encourage people to fill up the whole bag," she said. "Maybe we will give them a smaller bag for the scavenger hunt items and a bigger bag for more trash."
Tobe said she mainly hopes the hunt creates awareness. Last year, she picked up numerous fast food bags and containers, she said.
"The fact that a ton of people eat their lunch along the lake, maybe we need more awareness of putting things in trash cans or making sure they get them all the way in the trash can so it doesn't blow out," she said.
Prizes to be distributed include beverage containers, T-shirts and other small items, she said.

"It will be small things, nothing monumental," she said of the prizes. "We just hope to see a lot of people out there."

Started in the mid-1990s by former Grand Lake St. Marys State Park Manager Glen Cobb to mark Earth Day, the event drew more than 100 volunteers some years, current park manager Brian Miller said. In recent years, however, participation has waned, he said.

"In the 1990s and early 2000s, we would get overwhelming participation from all different types of groups and individuals," Miller said. "Anything from scouting groups to 4-H groups, all types of groups."

Miller said in years past it wasn't unusual for volunteers to gather 100 bags of trash. He stopped keeping track of the amount in recent years because participation had dipped so low, he said.

"There was a time the event had a large participation but we've seen it fall off," he said. "I challenged Abbey to come up with an idea so that we could get participation back up."

Cleanup day at a glance:

What: Annual lake cleanup day

When: 9 a.m.-noon Saturday

Where to meet: West Bank boat launch ramp, Celina; East Bank, first shelter house, St. Marys; Windy Point, first parking lot, Montezuma

Boats needed: People in boats are encouraged to pick up trash and other debris along the shoreline.

Details: Volunteers will be provided with gloves, bags and a list of scavenger hunt items. Prizes will be awarded to those who collect all items on the list.

More info: Call Grand Lake St. Marys State Park at 419-394-3611