PAWS volunteers met at Pampa’s city lake on Saturday, June 6 to clean up debris that could potentially harm the wildlife that resides there.
Tori Kelley is the volunteer who organized the cleanup by making posts on both her personal Facebook page and in a local Facebook group (Let it all out in Gray County).
“A lot of people participated in a relatively short amount of time (49 hours notice),” Kelley said.
“We had probably right at 20 people come out there, and some even brought their kids. We really collected a lot of trash.”
An animal control officer working for the city mentioned how much trash there was out at the city lake to Kelley after saving a goose that had been injured by metal debris. This information is what prompted Kelley to organize the cleanup.
More than a dozen large bags were filled in less than two hours of cleaning. Aside from the usual trash you would expect, volunteers also found an alarming amount or discarded fishing line, lures and hooks. There were also two chairs found that Kelley estimates to have been left there for quite a long time.
“The ducks and geese get their legs caught in the fishing line and it cuts off circulation to their feet, and sometimes they will lose their legs and feet because of it,” she said.
Unfortunately, trash and harmful debris were not the only things volunteers found.
“Sometimes, fisherman feel like turtles encroach on their fishing and eat the fish. In reality, the turtles really help with the ecosystem because the are not fast enough to get the healthy fish. They get the sick and dying fish,” Kelley said.
“Sometimes, those [misguided] fisherman just go ahead and cut their heads off (turtles) because they don’t want them there.”
Several decapitated turtles were found along the lake shore, as well as some living turtles who had fishing hooks and lures caught in their mouths.
“I really want to ask the City to put a sign out there because it’s actually illegal to kill turtles on City property,” Kelley said.
Kelley says that she noticed around five or six large trash cans for visitors of the lake to use, although none of those trash cans are placed around the back-side of the lake.
“People go to the other side of the lake where there’s kind of hidden (fishing) spots, and we found trash all in that area. More so than we found at the dock,” she said.
Although volunteers had to face the sad reality of what trash left behind can do to our local wildlife, Kelley says that volunteers enjoyed their day at the lake anyway.
“It was a beautiful day. It was early enough in the morning that it wasn’t too hot, and we had a good time,” she said.
Kelley hopes to organize more cleanups in the future, although she does not know if she wants to do it every two weeks, every three weeks or once a month. She said she will be playing it by ear for now.
If you would like to participate in the next cleanup, you can call PAWS at 806-669-5775 or keep an eye out for Kelley’s posts in local Facebook groups such as Let it all out in Gray County.
