LITTERING CONVICTION
Published in the July 26, 2025 Edition.
A small pickup truck. A juvenile elephant. Sixty cinder blocks. A grand piano with two people sitting on it.
Each of these items weigh roughly the same as the mountain of trash people hauled out of Convict Lake last month: 2,921 pounds. The five-day cleanup effort, led by the Tahoe-based nonprofit Clean Up the Lake, pulled 6,010 items from the bottom of the lake between June 2 and June 6.
“Convict was one of our favorite projects to date,” said Colin West, the organization’s founder.
Clean Up the Lake formed in 2021, when West and a team of divers circumnavigated the entire 72-mile shoreline of Lake Tahoe, removing 25,000 pounds of trash. Since then, the organization has expanded to other regional lakes, including Donner Lake, and, more recently, to Mono County.
Before launching a full-scale cleanup at Convict, the team first dove the lake in 2023 to gather preliminary data. Based on what they found, they estimated they might pull around 1,000 pounds in a full effort. But this year’s haul tripled that number.
“We were finding so much more trash than we expected,” said Jenny Uvira, project manager. “It really slowed us down.”
Over five days and 13 dives, the team covered nearly three miles of lake bottom. Diving at altitude is difficult, and Uvira said and they can typically only manage 0.2 miles per dive. Volunteers helped by using kayaks and jetskis to ferry waste up from divers below.
The effort is about more than just cleanup. It’s also a form of underwater surveying. As divers work, they track GPS locations, sort waste into 83 distinct categories, and look for signs of invasive species. The team then works with local governments to suggest changes in signage, infrastructure, and even create public art from salvaged materials.
Among the items pulled from Convict Lake, the divers found 70 tires, making up more than a third of the total weight and 2,066 beer cans, most of them found near the marina.
“That’s where people are coming back from their boat trips, so it’s not so surprising,” Uvira said. “Now we’re able to work with the marina and put signage or recycling bins there.”
Also during the dives, the team collected samples of aquatic plants, confirming an infestation of Eurasian Watermilfoil, an aggressive invasive species that disrupts ecosystems. Clean Up the Lake is now working with the U.S. Forest Service to explore possible mitigation strategies.
They also sampled the lake for invasive species, and confirmed there is an infestation of Eurasian Watermilfoil, an invasive plant which is harmful to aquatic ecosystems. The organization is now working with USFS to determine ways to reduce the species’ presence.
Next, the team will turn its focus to McLeod Lake, with a cleanup scheduled for September 15. Though more remote and harder to access than Convict, McLeod is a popular day hike destination, and, as Uvira notes, still vulnerable to human impact.
“It’s important for us to be able to show data from all the different types of places, what’s coming out of them, and how badly they’re getting affected,” she said.
Clean Up the Lake is actively seeking local volunteers for the McLeod mission.
