Lake Cleanup Prize On Line

MOST UNUSUAL CONTEST PART OF EVENT

There’s a treasure hunt going on at Beaver Lake Saturday with a swell prize on the line.

It’s an annual hunt that’s cleverly disguised as the Beaver Lake Cleanup.

It’s a fall tradition for folks to get together and spruce up the shoreline of our beloved lake by picking up litter. Volunteers never know what oddities they’ll find while walking the lake shore. That’s what this treasure hunt is all about.

For years the outdoors section of this newspaper has held a fun contest for the most unusual item of funk du jour plucked from the lake shore on cleanup day. We’re at it again on Saturday. During the cleanup, keep an eye out for the weird, the peculiar, the craziest piece of shoreline litter. Bring it to the free lunch at Prairie Creek park and enter it in the contest.

Ranger Alan Bland with the Army Corps of Engineers and your faithful outdoor reporter will have a table set up at the picnic shelter for volunteers to leave their treasured entry.

We’ll have a pad there for you to jot down your name and your entry. The winner will be picked by a mystery judge, which means we haven’t figured out yet who the judge will be.

There’s only a few rules.

Your entry has to be small enough and light enough that you can easily carry it by yourself. You have to take it home with you or cart it off to the trash bins before you leave the cleanup. Only one item per contestant, please.

I can hear you readers now. “Swell prize my eye.

You say that every year and all we win are some silly fi shing lures.”

Well, the contest has hit the big time this year.

And get this. We’ll have two winners. We’ll name a winner in the 16-and-under division and one in the over 16 division.

Each winner receives - tadah! - a $25 gift certificate to Crabby’s seafood restaurant in Rogers.

But nearly everyone is a winner at the Beaver Lake Cleanup. So many door prizes will be given away during lunch that almost everybody wins something.

Here’s how to get in on the fun. Pick up trash bags any time after 8 a.m. on Saturday at Hickory Creek, Prairie Creek, Rocky Branch, Lost Bridge North or Dam Site Lake parks. You’ll also get a souvenir shirt and a ticket for lunch at the Prairie Creek grand shelter.

The menu is hot dog fare with ice cream for dessert.

Fan out around the lake and fill a trash bag or three with trash. Then head to Prairie Creek around 11:30 a.m. if you want to eat lunch.

Bland said there’s a big need for people with boats to transport volunteers out on the lake. Just bring your boat to any of the parks where trash bags are doled out and let the volunteer know you have room in your boat for passengers. All boat skippers receive a special goodie bag of boating related items. Be sure to have a life jacket on board for everyone in your boat.

Volunteers may also drive over land to any spot on the lake to bag some trash.

Roads that dead-end at the lake will need a spruce up.

For boaters, the backs of coves are worth mining for litter.

There’s more. Rangers have placed 10 plastic Coca Cola bottles around the shoreline with a message in each bottle. Bring the message to lunch at Prairie Creek and get a major prizebag of goodies.

If that’s not enough, Ranger Bland off ers useful advice for winning the most unusual item contest: Think outside the box. You’re not going to win with a fi sh skeleton or an old fi shing lure. Look for stuff you wouldn’t think you’d fi nd on the lake shore.

We’re on the honor system here. No fair bringing junk from home to enter in the contest.

The Beaver Lake Cleanup is more fun than work and a fine way to spruce up our lake after a busy visitor season. See you Saturday at Prairie Creek.

FLIP PUTTHOFF IS OUTDOORS EDITOR FOR NWA MEDIA.

Outdoor, Pages 6 on 09/26/2013

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