From lifesaver to bird litter: Manitoba's used sandbags headed for zoos, landfill

WINNIPEG - From lifesaver to bird litter - more than one million sandbags used to stave off flood waters in Manitoba will soon be heading for zoos, construction sites and landfills.

As water from the second-worst flood in the last 100 years recedes, Manitobans in once-threatened communities are dismantling makeshift dikes and dams built with hundreds of thousands of bags filled with sand.

So what to do with all those used sandbags?

While some will go straight to landfills, others are a hot commodity for avid gardeners, construction companies and even zoos.

Bob Wrigley, curator of Winnipeg's Assiniboine Park Zoo, said the zoo wants as many used bags as possible. Every year, he said, the attraction goes through up to 76 cubic metres of sand.

Much of it is used as bird litter in a dozen exhibits containing everything from pheasants to owls, he said.

"Sand really works well, just like Kitty Litter for pet cats. When they (birds) cough up a pellet or have some waste, it's very easy to rake up and remove," Wrigley said.

"We go through a fair amount of sand ... If they're going to just dump this somewhere, it seems a shame because we need a lot of sand each year."

Some of the sand is also used for special enclosures such as those housing young reindeer. It makes it less likely for puddles of contaminated water to collect and pose a health threat to fawns, he said.

"Calves sometimes, not knowing any better, decide they're going to take a drink of water and that can make them very ill," Wrigley explained.

"The enclosures have to be very well-drained and sand is a perfect material to make sure the water drains away quickly. Having a good, dry enclosure for the offspring and the moms can mean the difference between the babies living or dying."

The Red River reached some of the highest levels on record this year. The river, which is normally about 200 metres wide, swelled to 22 kilometres wide in some parts. It covered 1,600 square kilometres at one point and many communities south of Winnipeg are still waterlogged.

Manitoba didn't use nearly as many sandbags this year as it has in past years thanks to permanent ring dikes in vulnerable areas and reusable tube dikes for some waterfront communities.

But in Winnipeg, which was mostly protected by the province's floodway, 500,000 sandbags were still needed to hold back rising waters.

Now, the city is spending about $1 million to pay contractors to collect those sandbags from backyards and driveways, likely starting next week.

Scott Payne, Winnipeg's flood co-ordinator, said any bags that have come into contact with river water are going straight to the landfill to avoid potential contamination. But the city hopes at least 100,000 will be recycled.

The bags will be given free to construction companies, homeowners who want to level out a patio and even horse stables who can use them to level out fields, he said.

"We're just starting to get to a point where we're receiving more and more requests for recycling which is great."

Provincial officials say the cleanup this year won't be nearly as mammoth as it has been in the past. Steve Topping with Manitoba Water Stewardship said during the so-called flood of the century in 1997, as many as 20 million sandbags were used.

This year, he said, one of the hardest hit areas south of Winnipeg, the Rural Municipality of Richot, only used about 500,000.

Once the water recedes, it's important to dismantle sandbag dikes quickly, since they can erode riverbanks and feed mould, Topping explained. Many of them are only good for landfill, he added.

"The sandbags themselves tend to deteriorate with mould and moisture. I'm not sure about their shelf life."

Randell McQuaker, executive director of Resource Conservation Manitoba, said every effort should be made to reuse and recycle the bags.

But sand on its own is a pretty innocuous material and there are worse things sitting in landfills, he suggested.

"In light of all the other environmental challenges that are facing us, the landfilling of sand is probably relatively minor compared to landfilling waste electronics or other nasty stuff."