So I’m standing on the only high bank in the Sparkleberry Swamp – tens of thousands of acres of uninhabited swamped forest – trying to decide whether to pitch the apple core into the lake or into the woods.
Oh, I know, I know, I know – the proper procedure would have been to triple bag the apple core in sanitized and deodorized Goretex baggies … and then heave it out the window when I got on I-95. But I didn’t.
I was seriously cogitating on the question of whether critters (one-celled and larger) would render the core into its constituent organic molecules faster in the water or on the land. I formed a hypothesis and lobbed the thing into the lake.
Where it may … or may not … have sunk.
.
Don’t feed the critters 
I would have thrown it into the woods
Deer, bear, ground hogs, squirrels, rabbits, and lots of other furry and feathered friends love apples.
Jack L
Critters Love Apples
Deer and other critters would make quick work of that apple core. Besides, it would degrade rapidly if not eaten. Orange peels are a bigger dilemma. They degrade, but aren’t naturally in most areas. If hiking, I wouldn’t want to see an old dried out peel left by a previous hiker, even if it would eventually go away. I don’t think critters would eat an orange peel.
Apples do not grow in Sparkleberry.
Your carelessness could alter that ecosystem for decades by feeding the local fauna with something they have no natural access to. Soon the catfish will be walking to NC to devastate the apple groves and it will be YOUR FAULT.
You’re supposed to throw it at a Duck
Didn’t you ever watch Chip & Dale torment Donald?
Didn’t you ever hear of …
“Johnny Appleseed” ?
I’ll gladly ship some of my deer down to your neck of the woods as soon as they finish eating everything in sight here.
Jack L
I think the southern paret of the state
is over run with deer.We don’t need yours.
So…
– Last Updated: May-13-10 12:07 PM EST –
So chippendale chipmunks hurl their applechunks,
whilst woodchuck whistles sticks past pigs?
Perched Spotted Owl
on rail of oil tanker's prow
gets nom-de-plume in poopy seagull digs.
And now apple-fed armies of Sparkleberry Swamp
are marchin' north with a Catfish Core,
to battle-coffee-grounds
wherein the brown trout surround,
Orange ya a'peelin' for Flushing Meadows War?
(Yes. His poetic bio's degradin'.)
Toss it on the coffee grounds. n.m.
it may degrade…but it’s still trash
…it might get eaten by critters, but it’s still TRASH for the next person to see. It may not be eaten or degrade before the next person uses that area. Have you ever pulled off to a gravel bar for a campsite or lunch break and find where the last person there left an old apple core or banana peel or similar degradables? It’s TRASH and another person’s half-eaten lunch is nasty looking. Carry it out and throw it in a trash can back in “civilization” or on your compost pile if you have one.
Hey String
You learned a lot in the great “Orange Peel Debacle”!!!
Interesting.
If it fell off a tree and layed there to rot, is it significantly less offensive? Perhaps if it fell off a tree and were partially eaten by a critter so it had teeth marks on it. Would it then be some animals trash?
While it may be so that you might find someone’s apple core up to a day later, I would find it hard to consider trash. Millions and millions of apples degrade around the planet each year. If we touch one, that suddenly makes it our responsibility.
But I would have thrown it on shore. I believe it would decompose much quicker there. They are usually half brown by the time you finish chewing. Hopefully, the invasive apples seeds won’t sprout and forever change the ecology of the swamp.
Wait for a billy goat gruff to come by
and fatten him up with it – you troll
if you eat it all the way down …
– Last Updated: May-13-10 11:07 AM EST –
...... what's left are the seeds , the stem and that funky thing on top ... oh the delima , can I live with the guilt , pocket or drop em ??
Last time I threw something real hard it hurt my shoulder , so I'd probably drop em .
Maybe a purist would save them up to make apple soup ?? Maybe a skin cream or shampoo mash ??
Waste not , want not !!
Maybe a real tough purist would just swallow the the little leftovers and transport them out via internally for relocation back to the metropolis ??
Feed it to the dog
… then let him decide where to put it
the dog - that’s funny lol , but true !!
another option
My favorite college professor was an eccetric ex-hippie who would ride his bike to work, down the hall and into the classrom. Then he would proceed to eat an apple in one hand while solving differentai equations on the board with the other. The WHOLE apple: stem, seeds, core, everything.
I have tried this, but the seeds are pretty bitter and have a small amount of cyanide in them. I would throw the core into the woods.
I dispose of mine in the spots
where people won’t go and it won’t be seen but biodegradable is going in the bio, not the landfill.
our responsibility
Apples that fall from a tree are not your responsibility.
Apples that you carry somewhere in your lunch bag are certainly your responsibility. The question is what you decide is the best way to deal with that.
I generally follow Leave No Trace (www.lnt.org) principles. That keeps it simplest. Pack out what you carry in, and don’t remove anything else on your way out. That’s the best way to keep The Wild wild, and to make sure it’s that way when I, or other users, return.
Will that apple core get eaten and/or degrade in a few weeks? Probably, but maybe not before the next person arrives. And if 50 people go through there in a month, and all leave their “biodegradeable” food waste, maybe it’ll start piling up. Or maybe racoons will start hanging out there more. And Bit by bit The Wild becomes just another city park.