Please Put Lids on Jars you are Trashing!!
 

because animals can get in the garbage and get their heads stuck in the jars...we had to put a skunk out of it's misery this morning because he got in our *snapped closed and bungeed* rubbermaid garbage container and got his head stuck in a peanut butter jar and was suffering from no water/food...I feel horrible because this was an animal who suffered because of a human..so please, when you put jars in the trash or recycling, put the lid on so maybe this won't happen much more :(

We're not allowed to put lids on our recycling, lids go in the garbage, jars go in the recycling bin. We do however put our glass recyclables in a blue bag and tie it before we take it out.

Same here. Lids in garbage, jar in recycling. Jar get stuck in dishwasher with the regular load so even in our recycling bin theres no residual food which would be of interest to animals.

Our "trash" has nothing but the few items that we can't do anything else with. We compost and recycle everything else.

Ewww... did he spray ya???

Oh no, that's horrible! I always, always cut those stupid plastic things that hold 6-8 cans/bottles together - ever since I saw a documentary of a sea otter with a ring trapped around its neck. That image is burned in my brain.

But what to do about the jar issue? Our recycling goes in an open bin, so we would have a problem to keep animals away if it were outside ... we keep it in the garage and it just goes out a couple of hours before it is picked up.

Our recycling instructions say we have to take the lids off - lids go in the garbage, since unfortunately they usually aren't coded for what type of material they are made from. (Otherwise they would have to take every lid off and deal with it separately, which probably means the jar is not recycled in the end).

Anyone know enough about recycling centers to find out if this is correct information? I am always pulling lids *off* other people's recycled bottles and jars!

Yeah I thought it was separate too and we put ours in a bag that goes into a closed in, no way a little rascal is getting into there.

Sorry to hear about the animals. That is very sad. :(

That is a shame... Luckily no one has had their head stuck in one of our old jars! I will make sure we wash them before we put them in the recycle bin so it doesn't happen near us.

Lexxiss seems to have the correct answer for us, to wash out jars completely so there's no food residue to tempt critters.

ddc - no, thank goodness, no spraying happened.