Cleaning up in the storm

We're cleaning up from the storm here on the pet-friendly Central Coast beaches of NSW. On the afternoon (beach) dog walk today, I hesitantly bagged Pema's poo she dropped at water's edge - on an incoming tide. Here I am a passionate advocate for composting and for keeping green and food waste out of our anaerobic (no-air) landfills because of the toxicity and methane problems they create in a dump – and I’m picking up Pema’s organic waste in a plastic bag to place in a council rubbish bin and truck off to landfill. Why do I do this? Because it’s the ‘law’ and as the proprietor of Barking Mad, there is a sneaking suspicion that certain council rangers want to ‘bag’ me.

Does it make sense to do this? Absolutely not! Dog poo is less toxic than human poo because they ingest fewer chemicals, heavy metals and pharmaceuticals. After this huge storm, Sydney Water legally dumped tonnes of human sewage into waterways; regional centres also sent sewage into waterways.

The ocean is brown, warnings are current to stay out of the water due to sewage and I’m picking up Pema’s little poos on an incoming tide with a plastic bag that was made overseas (from oil), shipped here (with fuel and associated pollution), trucked to my local store where I bought it (being taxed first on my income and secondly on my purchase), then using the bag to pick up a totally natural product to truck to a landfill far away where it will slowly decompose and create methane.

Some of that methane will not escape to assist global warming, but will stay in the landfill and breakdown the REALLY toxic things in there to create groundwater pollution. Pema’s poo would have been better in the ocean today; no one would have stepped on it and the world would be a minute bit cleaner. Laws do not always make sense. Remember, when you parallel park with less than one metre between you and the car in the front and the rear – you are breaking the law!