Opinion – É Logo Ali: Take with you what the cat buries

On the eve of starting the journey towards Mount Roraima, the organizer of the trip, businessman Magno Souza, from the Roraima Adventures agency, gathered the group for a lecture on what we would find along the way. Among the specific perrengues that we would experience over the course of 10 days, one detail deserved a thorough explanation: what, how and where we should dispose of our feces. The number one rule of Paraitepuy Park, in Venezuela, where the mountain is, he explained to us, is “nothing is taken from there and nothing is left there”. This would include not only crystals and flowers (be careful, backpacks can be searched on the way out), but also our most intimate waste.

Amid nervous laughter from the audience, Souza introduced us to what would be the makeshift “toilet” for the trip: a vertical, narrow and unstable tent, which would house a folding stool on which a plastic toilet seat would fit. Between the seat structure and the seat, we should place thick black bags in which we would make our “number 2” with some comfort. Once the work is finished, we should pour a handful of lime over the contents of the bag – which under no circumstances should contain anything liquid –, closing it with a knot and leaving it outside the tent. A porter was hired to take that pile of bags daily in a specific container down the pile, from where they would be taken out of the park following instructions from the international specialist in disposal Inpacs, to some Venezuelan destination.

Of course, that seemed a little weird to those who imagined that we would only need to take a little trowel to, like cats, bury the final product of arepas and pasta digested on the trails. But if that was the rule, then it would be done. Not that the action proved to be as simple as it seemed: the strong winds from the top of the hill insisted on knocking down the vertical tent, with its narrow, fragile and unstable structure. Sometimes we ourselves were tossed around during the process. If the reader wants to have fun, he can imagine the scene of girls trying hard not to let number 1 out with number 2, as is the habit of 9 out of 10 women, while holding the nylon walls of the tent, with their pants down and feet trying to give a little more support to the set. Is it suffocation that calls? Oh!

The solution found in that specific case included a factor of high, very high value when we talk about trails and perrengues: privacy. Even fighting with the structure, it allowed us to avoid any incidents, in a scenario in which tall grass and trees are very rare and the spaces for camping are very tight. Besides, in the stony ground of the hill, it wouldn’t be possible to bury anything most of the time. Cats suffer there – but there are no cats on Mount Roraima. They’re not silly or anything.

But don’t be the least aware to imagine that this is the rule for all trails and hikes in nature. In fact, there are few itineraries that include a worker to perform this thankless service. But then, how to put an end to what the cat buries, after all?

The first and most obvious solution is to do like the cat itself: bury the feces and other organic waste, such as fruit peels and leftover snacks. Nature, at first, will take care of absorbing what suits it from what’s left, right? There are controversies.

While it is true that organic waste decomposes when buried, some care must be taken when choosing a funeral location. To begin with, one should always look for a place far from water bodies, such as rivers, waterfalls, lakes, springs and such. The reason is simple: feces can contain pathogens and contaminate water. Nobody wants to see a jaguar with diarrhea, do they?

Okay, but what is the minimum distance to keep from the water at the time of tightening? And then things get complicated. If the citizen were to open a septic tank in his house and there was a well on the property, the technically recommended distance would generally be at least 15 meters. Only we are not talking here about pits of constant use, but about occasional relief. So what you can say is: it depends.

It depends on the level of the terrain, how much waste will be left in the hole, even the health of the user. And it depends much more, mainly, on the number of people walking that trail. Because it is easy to imagine the level of environmental impact of filling the septic holes, so to speak, in an area such as the Itatiaia National Park, on the border of Rio de Janeiro and Minas Gerais, which in 2019 received more than 127,000 visitors.

And a detail that is not irrelevant: it is not enough to bury organic waste. Toilet paper, baby wipes, food packaging, everything should be taken away, not buried with the organic material. Ah, but doesn’t paper decompose? Yes, it decomposes. But it takes about 4 months. And it can still be unearthed by some stronger rain, spreading what you don’t want to see composing what should just be a beautiful landscape.

To reconcile all this, many parks around the world and longer trail guides require their hikers to carry what is known as a shit tube, a name that means nothing more than a poop tube. Basically, a pvc tube with a glued base and a sealed lid with a rubber ring in which the user stores their organic waste, and adds a handful of lime to dry the remaining moisture and eliminate odors. It is recommended that, before throwing the organic material into the tube, it is wrapped in paper or dry leaves, to facilitate cleaning of the tube itself afterwards, as well as disposal when it reaches a suitable location. And no, the proper place will never be a normal toilet: lime can clog the plumbing. Better to throw it in the trash, preferably a container for organic waste and, even better, in biodegradable bags.

“The most positive side of the shit tube is that, in very frequented mountains, there is less waste there”, ponders Natachi Silva,31, graphic designer, trail guide and adventurer. “I would walk away and bury it in the right place, but it’s not always easy to explain this to newbies, so it’s easier to say ‘no trash on the mountain’ than trying to teach the culture of appropriateness and explaining that you have to take away the used paper. , the handkerchief etc”, adds she, who uses an ultra-light model that is less rustic than the usual rough tube, manufactured by Gaia Adventures.

The 2.0 model of the traditional poop tube uses a thinner, more flexible PVC tube, developed by mountaineer Tom Garbin. “We started by manufacturing the shit tube with a normal PVC pipe, but it is a heavy construction pipe that is difficult to handle, an adaptation for the user and never an equipment designed for this purpose”, he explains. After many prototypes, the Outdoor Portable Trash was born. A name, let’s face it, much better behaved to include in the next letter to Santa Claus.