A rather angry social media exchange between Red Hill Recreation Area users a couple of years ago about dog poop, of all things, prompted a call to action by a local business owner that has calmed the angst.
“People were just going back and forth about all the bags of dog poop strewn along the trails that weren’t being picked up and thrown away,” recalled Brion After, who owns Independence Run & Hike in Carbondale.
The solution was fairly simple — provide more disposal stations along the lower sections of trail and people would be more likely to dispose of the bags.
A dog owner and avid trail user himself, After pointed out that most dogs tend to do their business within the first 10-15 minutes of a hike, so the stations needed to be strategically placed and increased in number.
The Red Hill Council, which oversees the area, including the popular Mushroom Rock Trail, in conjunction with the Town of Carbondale and the U.S. Bureau of Land Management, had also documented through its dog poop flagging awareness campaign that the lower trail sections were definitely the most impacted.
Not only were people leaving bags of poop along the trail, unbagged poop was creating a nasty situation and affecting the natural environment, Red Hill Council President Chris Brandt noted.
“At one point, it seemed a little absurd how much time and effort we were devoting to managing dog poop, having to seek out grant money each year, and distracting from other more important trail maintenance priorities,” Brandt said of the earlier days before the newer trail head and parking lot were constructed in 2020.
Since then, an additional disposal station was installed near the Three Poles section, but that still wasn’t enough.
Brandt said it was cost prohibitive and too labor intensive to install even more disposal stations when the flagging campaign called attention to the ongoing problem.
That’s when After and his crew at Independence Run & Hike stepped in to fund two more disposal stations and serve as the official poop patrol, changing out the bags and regularly emptying the full bags.
“I said, you know, I’ll pay for the whole thing, and we’ll manage it,” After said. “I don’t think they’ve ever overflowed in the year and a half that we’ve done it. It’s something I’m pretty proud of, that we can help out the community in that way.”
At first, he said he was paying for it out of pocket, but now he’s using the small amount of money the store receives for its used shoe donation project to fund the poop patrol.
“So, whenever people donate their old running shoes in the bins out in front of our store, that goes toward the cost of managing this,” After said. “It’s kind of a cool circle.”
Store employee Will Fisher said he’s happy to be part of the solution, but added it’s still up to trail users to be personally responsible. Included in that is not using the disposal stations that are meant for dog poop for regular trash and cans that can be recycled. That should still be packed out and disposed of properly, he said.
“Otherwise, we have to fish it out, and that gets kind of gross,” Fisher said. “It doesn’t take a lot of effort on the part of people to just hold onto it a little bit longer and put it in the recycle bin at the trailhead.”
If any members of the public, especially dog owners who use the trails regularly, want to help out and take a poop patrol shift, After said he’d welcome that.
“We have a backpack and all the replacement materials that you’d need,” he said.
Brandt said he appreciates the support from the business community to help maintain the Red Hill area.
“It’s a lot of work to regularly carry out heavy bags of poop, and it can be roughly 50 pounds, once or twice per week, for each bin,” he said. “They are not doing this for attention, they are doing it because it’s the right thing to do, and something that makes a real impact, setting a good example.”
In addition, Brandt noted that the initial trails leading away from the trailhead are being managed with the assistance of local adopt-a-trail supporters, including Osmia and White Horse Yoga, Brandt noted.
As seasonal use of the Red Hill trails increases, Brandt also issued a reminder of the leash and “under control” rules for dogs. The lower trails (Ruthies Run, Lower Three Gulch, B-Line, and C-Line) are on Town property and fall under Carbondale’s leash law, requiring a 6-foot maximum leash to be used. Once on BLM land, leashes are still strongly encouraged, as dogs must not be allowed to stray off of the established trail, he emphasized.
“Using a leash helps to prevent the cumulative impacts to the natural environment along the edge of the trail,” Brandt said. “We’ve lost significant quantities of vegetation and sensitive cryptobiotic soil patches, also known as biocrust, resulting from hundreds of dogs wandering all over the place off leash.”