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nafex - Re: [NAFEX] Litter's Legacy

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  • From: Lucky Pittman <lucky.pittman@murraystate.edu>
  • To: North American Fruit Explorers <nafex@lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [NAFEX] Litter's Legacy
  • Date: Mon, 13 Dec 2004 08:26:31 -0600

I suspect that these projected 'decomposition times' relate to these objects buried in the anaerobic conditions of a landfill. I can assure you that a styrofoam cup or plastic milk jug, lying on top of the ground, will degrade, due to the combined effects of UV light and bacterial(many Pseudomonas spp. have been shown to be able to use plastics as a carbon source) and fungal metabolism, oftentimes in less than three years.
Likewise, the steel(tinned) can, if buried just at the soil surface, will certainly be gone in far less than 90 years - there have been thousands of direct-seeded nut trees planted with a steel can with an 'X' cut in the bottom & peeled back somewhat to allow emergence of the seedling, shoved down over them to provide some protection against pilfering by mice/squirrels/raccoons, and in the vast majority of cases, the can rusts completely away before the seedling attains sufficient caliper to require removal, or even cutting of the rim of the can to prevent girdling.
That still doesn't give folks a good reason for throwing them out hither and yon.

LLP


At 11:08 AM 12/12/2004 -0600, you wrote:
'Ello, All!
I try not to be fanatical on this topic, just do what I can, but you
hear so many different decomposition rates for objects I thought this was
nice in having it all in one list. It came from a brochure from a paper
newsletter from the Missouri Forestkeepers Network, a State Department of
Conservation organization set up to monitor the state of the state's
forests.

Litter's Legacy

Objects Decomposition Time

Styrofoam container >1 million years

Plastic Jug 1 million years

Disposable diaper 550 years

Aluminum can 200-500 years

Tinned can 90 years

Leather shoe 45 years





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