The May 21 cleanup of Kingfisher Creek took place as scheduled. In spite of the event being advertised as annual it had not been done last year.  Vegetation had grown up so high the creek could not be seen almost the entire way from Wilson to Bowling. What a difference a day makes to improve the appearance of the street when there is a crew of about 20 neighbors and friends to help. 80% of the work was completed in 2 hours. Click on photos to enlarge.

Lessons Learned

1. Unwanted papers are washed down Carden and Leonard during rain storms and wind up littering in near the creek. Please clean up these papers when delivered and advise the advertisers to take you off their list.

2.  A significant number of filled doggy bags were tossed into the brush and not carried home.  This is worse than not using bags where the waste disintegrates in a few days. Bags can take years. Photo too disgusting to show.

3. The use of woody plant pullers, borrowed from Warner Parks thanks to Melissa, made it much easier to pull up invasive species by the roots easily. This stops the plants from just growing right back. Left side photo shows one standing up. Right side shows Kevin in action.

4. Where the creek runs under Leonard, there is a dam of gravel which creates a pond that could provide a mosquito breeding ground.  Committee Chair Bob is removing some of invasive plants at the bridge.

5. Committee Secretary Cyril provided and operated a chain saw which made quick work of some of the invasive trees and dead branches. Left photo right to left Lucius, Revell & Cyril

6. How to identify plant signs all along the route were a great help to workers to avoid the poison ivy.

7. It took three people to clean up around the Carden bridge.

8. Most of the crew worked the creekfrom Carden to Leonard. Amazingly there was very little trash to collect along Rolland Road (see 1 & 2 for the exceptions). Chairman Bob G. arranged to have one lane of the road blocked on the creek side. This was a brilliant move since we avoiding having to submit a comprehensive plan and employ an off duty policeman. A number of cones and lane blocked signs were rented. Traffic on the open lane proceeded with caution with very few exceptions.  Being able to put so much brush on the road made it much easier.  Thanks very much to the Rolland Residents for putting up with this. Metro is scheduled for Monday to take all the brush away.

9. At noon a potluck lunch was enjoyed by all. Two residents unable to attend the clean up kindly provided homemade BBQ pork tenderloin.

Report & photos by Bob Duthie