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Silipint Partners With Leave No Trace
Silipint x Leave No Trace
As you’re shopping for your unbreakable Silipint gifts this year, you’re also helping support Silipint to make a contribution to the Leave No Trace Center for Outdoor Ethics. Starting on Black Friday, through December 31st, 2018, 5% of our total sales on Silipint.com will be donated to the organization.
In our efforts to encourage resourcefulness through the simplicity of an unbreakable and reusable silicone cup, we found a natural alignment with the Leave No Trace education mission.
Who is Leave No Trace?
Leave No Trace is a national, non-profit organization whose mission is to “sustain healthy, vibrant natural lands for people to enjoy now and in the future.” They aim to provide resourceful information to 15 million adults and children every year on how to minimize their footprint while enjoying the great outdoors. Learn more about their mission, vision, and values here.
To accomplish this, most donations go towards educational programs and services. The Center distributes its educational materials for specific outdoor activities and ecosystems to people young and old, nationwide. It also helps implement important training opportunities and workshops on the latest Leave No Trace practices, and actively promotes volunteerism. In addition, the Center utilizes its membership dollars to conduct research on best practices for responsible outdoor recreation.
The organization has three specific goals to achieve their educational efforts. They hope to Leave No Trace 1) in every park, 2) for every kid, and 3) for every person who ventures outside. To achieve these goals, they rely on delivering education in multiple ways:
- Numerous Leave No Trace Certification Courses for adults and kids, both online and in person
- Education Outreach via interpretive materials, staff and volunteers, onsite signage available at various parks, forests and protected areas across the U.S.
- Online learning materials like blog articles, videos, and social media all aimed at bringing awareness to critical issues that face our environment
Products available to buy online
Leave No Trace Seven Principles
The organization has seven core principles that they use to help break down how to best minimally impact the outdoors as you’re enjoying it. A great way to learn about these principles and how to implement them during your travels is through these educational materials that you can buy and review beforehand.
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Plan Ahead and Prepare
The outdoors can be somewhat unpredictable. Before you travel somewhere, even if you’ve been there a dozen times, it’s important to research information about the location ahead of time. In doing so, you’ll learn about the fire conditions, local weather reports, active wildlife in the area. Equip yourself with the right tools to avoid a negative impact on the wild during your trip.
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Travel and Camp on Durable Surfaces
An important guideline from Leave No Trace is that “good campsites are found, not made.” The reason this is so important is that every time you step off the trail you are affecting nature in some way. Setting up camp in designated areas, don’t disturb protected riparian habitats, and staying on the trails as you’re exploring, are all excellent ways to implement this principle.
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Dispose of Waste Properly
“Pack it in, pack it out” is a great way to understand this guideline. Don’t leave food or litter in your campsite. Some may think that something like a fruit or vegetable is no harm to wildlife but leaving something like that behind disturbs the natural environment and order. This is also extremely important to remember when you’re near water. There are very specific guidelines for disposing of waste near water.
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Leave What You Find
As you explore and enjoy the outdoors, it’s important to leave things undisturbed. There is a lot going on in nature behind what we can see. Rocks fall to certain places, animals store items for their home, and beautiful things emerge from an undisturbed ecosystem. Allow everyone else to see what you’ve seen by leaving things untouched.
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Minimize Campfire Impacts
Extremely important to implement when you’re in the outdoors. Campfires can have a devastating effect on the environment. As we go back to our preparing stage, this is very important to know ahead of time. Are campfires allowed? Do they have designated fire rings? There are right ways to enjoy a fire and there are also very wrong ways, make sure you’re on the winner’s side.
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Respect Wildlife
Another great thing to learn ahead of time, the active wildlife hanging around. Knowledge is power and safety. Have the appropriate food storage for the animals that are in the area. Don’t approach wildlife, but observe and appreciate from a distance. As we mentioned before, the outdoors are unpredictable and wildlife plays a large part in that. Don’t put yourself or the animals in danger.
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Be Considerate of Other Visitors
Through understanding and following the other principles, you will most likely be an excellent camp neighbor. Keep in mind that other people are trying to enjoy a wonderful weekend outside too. Don’t be in a rush, yield to others on the trail. If possible, camp away from the trail and other visitors, and let your neighbors enjoy a peaceful night sky without noise pollution.
Why We Choose to Leave No Trace
The team at LNT makes it very clear that leave no trace does not equal “have no fun”. It just helps us understand nature around us and leave space for future generations to have fun too. The principles of Leave No Trace align with common habits that lead us towards a more sustainable mindset. Seeing the importance of reducing your impact in nature is an easy way to transition into reducing your impact as an everyday consumer. At the end of the day, our items have to go somewhere. We hope through educational resources, it becomes clear that we have to be more selective about our products and habits, to ensure we aren’t constantly adding to the landfills, oceans, and wildlife habitats with our trash.
We invite you to learn more and get involved at www.LNT.org.
Cover photo by The Wilderness Collective
