DOVETAIL, North Dakota — The town has added a separate collection pass after 23 unassigned gray trash carts appeared beside household bins and were found to contain clean duplicates of ordinary items still inside nearby homes. Regular trash service will continue, and residents have been asked not to open or move a cart they do not recognize.
Dovetail issues one green numbered cart to each utility account. Sanitation driver Cal Noll noticed the first gray carts Tuesday along Alder and Depot streets. They matched the town's size and wheel spacing but carried no manufacturer mark, serial number or lifting instructions. None appeared on purchase, delivery or repair records.
The gray carts were not filled with refuse. One held a clean blue oven mitt like the worn mitt hanging in the nearest kitchen. Another contained six library books whose titles and due slips matched books stacked inside the house, except the duplicates had never been stamped as checked out. A third held a child's left boot, dry and unworn, while the original remained muddy on a porch.
Public works foreman Elsie Rusk stopped collection and contacted the households before examining additional carts. Residents identified duplicate keys, framed photographs, a soup ladle and a sealed bag of dog food. The copies reproduced scratches, handwriting and faded labels but showed none of the use that created those marks. A duplicate photograph had the same crease as the original while its paper remained smooth.
No household admitted ordering an extra cart or placing property inside one. Doorbell cameras showed the curbs empty late Monday and the gray containers standing there at dawn, without recording an arrival between those times. Several cameras briefly displayed the households' own interiors while the carts appeared, though they are outdoor models with fixed lenses.
The town created an overflow route using a flatbed rather than the compactor. Workers tagged each cart by address, photographed its contents and moved it to a fenced public works yard. Residents could decline to identify an object, and Rusk said nothing will be returned, discarded or used to settle ownership disputes until the town attorney reviews the process.
Molded carts are sometimes delivered without markings, and household goods can be copied or purchased in matching condition, said Mara Cole, a municipal risk consultant advising Dovetail. Cole said pranks involving keys or interior photographs would raise serious privacy concerns. She could not explain how wear marks appeared on unused materials or why some copies concerned items no visitor had seen.
The separate route changed Wednesday's collection by about two hours. Some residents waited beside their regular bins to prevent mix-ups, while others kept all carts near their houses. At one duplex, both tenants claimed the same gray cart because it contained a glass baking dish each remembered inheriting from a different grandmother. Their original dishes remained in separate cupboards and differed only in a small chip.
Workers locked 19 carts in the yard overnight and left four at curbs at residents' request. By morning, the stored objects were gone. Each cart instead held a neat bag of ordinary household trash matching the address on its tag, including packaging, sweepings and mail already placed in the green bins for Thursday pickup.
Rusk compared the bags without opening private correspondence. Their weights matched the green-bin loads within two ounces. The originals were still at the curbs, but residents said several useful items thrown away earlier in the week had returned clean to drawers and shelves. The town collected both sets and waived refuse limits rather than require families to choose one.
At the end of Thursday's route, the crew returned to find 23 gray carts arranged along the inside of the locked yard fence. There were also four smaller carts not seen at any residence. Each contained a clean pair of work gloves in the exact size of one sanitation employee. The fifth employee's cart was empty except for a printed route slip showing his home address as the next stop.