As avid rowers of the Los Gatos Rowing Club, we frequently encounter trash floating in the Lexington Reservoir during our practices. The scope of this problem is alarming. Every year, the San Francisco Bay is overwhelmed by a staggering 7 trillion pieces of microplastics, equating to roughly a million pieces per resident, according to the San Francisco Estuary Institute. This alarming influx is primarily due to urban runoff, which poses severe threats to marine life and the broader ecosystem. Determined to help address this issue, we worked with the Creek Connections Action Group and Valley Water to gather the community to help preserve the pristine beauty of our local waters.
On National River Cleanup Day, May 18, we worked to clean the Lexington Reservoir area with a dedicated team of 24 volunteers, including students from The Harker School, Fischer Middle School, Rolling Hills Middle School, Bellarmine College Preparatory, Valley Christian School and Los Gatos High School. Volunteers were also members of the Los Gatos Rowing Club and Scouts Troop 339; and we worked alongside adult advocates. It was heartening to see people of all ages uniting for the common cause of environmental preservation.
Starting along the reservoir banks, we quickly spotted pollutants such as cans and bottles. A closer inspection revealed tiny, colorful plastics scattered across the embankment. Knowing that microplastics are the silent killers of ecosystems, which pose choking hazards to wildlife, we meticulously removed these harmful materials.
We also began to come across numerous bits of plastic foam, which we tracked back to a primary source: five large, three-foot-tall blocks of Styrofoam. This petroleum-based material is particularly harmful, because it doesn’t biodegrade and its form allows it to float on water surfaces, endangering marine life​.
Finally, to celebrate our hard work, we enjoyed a rock-skipping competition, taking in the beauty of the newly-cleaned scenery. By the end of the day, our efforts netted more than 200 pounds of trash, making the Lexington Reservoir cleaner and safer for everyone.
This was just one of 48 Valley Water and Creek Connections Action Group initiatives for National River Cleanup Day. Across the region, hundreds of volunteers joined hands to protect our aquatic ecosystems. We invite everyone to sign-up for our next cleanup event on Coastal Cleanup Day, Sept. 21, when we will be returning to the Lexington Reservoir in Los Gatos. By making a concerted effort to stop littering—and picking up trash when we see it—we can tackle the plastic pollution problem plaguing the San Francisco Bay Area.
Aditya and Trisha Shivakumar are Harker High School students and members of the Bay Area Chapter of Water1st.org
