My Battle With The Brick Bin: A Tale.

So firstly, the brick bin is not a bin. It sits in the woods of Otterbourne Hill Reservoir. I'm not really sure what they do there but there is an enclosed reservoir and woods surrounding it. It's a lovely location for a not-too-long dog walk.

Not far into the woods sits this brick box thing:

I don't know what it's for or where it leads. I had assumed because it's next to the reservoir that it could be a drain or man hole.

Generally it looks quite dangerous for animals as I some small things would be able to climb out, like a hedgehog, although I thought a hedgehog also wouldn't be likely to be able to climb in either!

So I haven't really walked past it before as it's on a different track and I usually take the same one, on this day though I fancied a change, that was my first mistake!

This is what met my gaze when I looked in:

Coffee cups, leaves, some wrappers, but worst of all....POO BAGS.

(Insert rant: what is the point of picking up your dogs poo if you're just going to fling the bag!!?!?)

So I decided I'd clear the bags, easy enough, I took my litter picker and a bag and filled it up:

However, as I dug down, I realised I was still finding poo bags. When my bag got full, I still kept uncovering poo bags.

I went passed a layer of leaves so that's one Autumn. Then my litter picker also broke. So I realised that I would need a bigger bag.

I returned the next day, at dark (because you don't really want anybody to see you shovelling poop) and dug the rest of the bags out...

Don't go thinking this is one of those small IKEA bags, it's the large one. The one you can fit a king size duvet and 2 pillows into. One of those. I was knackered from the digging but I tried to get further down to see if I could find what it was covering but I wasn't getting anywhere and decided I couldn't be bothered! I'd dug at least 2 years worth of poop up judging by the leaf layer, if somebody had to access it they'd have had a crap job.

So that was fun. I felt uber dirty. I then had to drag the IKEA bag full of poop back to where the bin was (checks google maps so I can give you an accurate calculation of distance) which was 160 metres away, doesn't seem like much but when you're dragging a bag of poo it feels it.

So I decanted the poop into the poo bin and went home feeling like I'd done some heroic deed.

I knew I had to fill in the hole in though. Which would have been another task but I was going away for the weekend so I thought I'd leave it until I got back.

My husband checked the hole on Saturday while I was away and was delighted to report it was still clear. However, when I returned on Sunday and we went to walk the dogs, THERE WAS A POO BAG IN IT!

Whoever considers this brick thing to be their dog poo bin, obviously doesn't ever look in it, otherwise they'd have seen all of their poo bags had been moved.

It was then I knew, I needed to act FAST! So the next morning, I went to B&Q and got 2 x 100L bags of woodchip and 2 x 50L bags of soil. The woodchip bags weighed a tonne and I don't lift weights bruh, just dogs!

I took my trusty IKEA bag with me and a shovel so I could use that to pull it in the same way I dragged all the poop away. After carting one bag up there, I thought "I'll just try and fill it in with leaves and mud from around it!". Great idea.

So I shovelled all these leaves, hoping to god that I didn't uncover more poo, and managed to fill up the brick bin quite well.

I did want to put a tree in it, but it was going to get a bit costly and I couldn't decide which one. I had seen a Holly bush for sale at B&Q when I was getting the woodchip and thought "YES! That will send a great message, a prickly bush for a prick of a person!" but I didn't get it as I thought I best wait and see what I've got to work with. Then nature handed me a prickly bush! THANK YOU NATURE!

The Holly bush was growing up from another bigger Holly tree so it was quite well rooted. I stuck the bits I could dig up into the leaves with a bit of soil but not much:

I don't it will grow but if not I can always get a proper holly plant and use more soil! This ^ is how full it was of leaves. I wanted to add woodchip to the top so it looked finished and purposeful so the bugger wouldn't just think it was a leaf bin!

So this is it now. Looking much better than before! If I see another poo bag on it, I will be making a sign, bigger than ever before!!

Voila! Some very sore shoulders but worth it to fight the evil that is poo bag flingers!!!!

Thanks for reading this tale of lies, betrayal and resilience!

Facts about biodegradable poo bags:

Did you know, that they need oxygen and sunlight to be able to decompose? Therefore, them being in this brick bin meant they'd never break down. If they did it could be from worms eating the bags which could then mean, in heavy rain full, the toxins from the poo could leak into the reservoir. Hence the importance of clearing it.

Biodegradable plastics don't break down if they are deep in landfill as they are starved of light and oxygen.