LORNE PRAIRIE, North Dakota — The city has paused curbside compost collection after residents opening their carts found personal objects and fresh plant material they said had been buried or discarded years earlier. Weekly trash and recycling routes are unchanged, and officials said no hazardous material has been identified.
Lorne Prairie collects grass, leaves, garden waste and food scraps from about 1,900 households between April and November. Material is ground and composted at the public works yard, then screened and offered to residents each spring. The city asked customers to leave green carts empty this week while it cleans two trucks and inspects the processing line.
The first report came from Teresa Uhl, who found a red rubber ball on top of coffee grounds in her cart Monday morning. Uhl said the ball belonged to a dog that died in 2017 and had been placed beneath a lilac bush with the animal's collar. The lilac and the grave remain undisturbed in her fenced backyard.
Other residents reported a child's brass bracelet, a set of house keys replaced in 2021 and several bulbs wrapped in newspaper dated 1998. Most objects were clean but damp. The plant material was more difficult to place: cut peonies appeared fresh in October, and one household received tomato vines bearing the same numbered ties used in a garden removed for a garage addition six years ago.
The city created a claim table at the public works office and asked residents to bring photographs or descriptions rather than search carts belonging to neighbors. By Tuesday afternoon, 31 items had been logged and 19 returned. No cash, identification cards or human or animal remains were among them.
Public works director Ina Sorrel said carts are not exchanged during collection and have molded serial numbers assigned by address. Route cameras show workers emptying the affected carts normally on October 5 and October 12. Several residents said the returned objects appeared only after the truck had visited, leaving them in carts that should have been empty.
Compost operations can uncover old household debris, particularly when a facility receives soil or brush from construction sites, said Reeve Pol, a solid-waste consultant retained by the city. Pol said machinery might move such items into finished compost. That would not readily account for objects appearing in emptied curbside containers before screened compost was distributed.
Employees opened both collection trucks and removed compacted material from behind their packer blades. They found ordinary food waste, leaves and two sealed bags of potting soil. A small wooden marker bearing Uhl's former street number was wedged beneath a hydraulic shield. Uhl said she had painted that marker for the dog's grave and had not noticed it missing.
Residents differed on whether they wanted the items back. Uhl reclaimed the ball but asked the city to retain the marker. A retired teacher accepted a packet of marigold seeds labeled in her late husband's handwriting and planted six in a kitchen pot. She said three opened by evening, producing colorless flowers with roots growing above the soil.
The city will skip one collection cycle and decide Friday whether to resume service. Households may bring ordinary yard waste to the gate during staffed hours, but the material will be stored separately from existing windrows. Sorrel said the city will not excavate private property or determine ownership where a claim cannot be supported.
Uhl left the recovered ball in a sealed evidence tote at the public works office. Staff said it remained still until the evening route trucks were parked. It then rolled against the side nearest her neighborhood and pressed there, flattening slightly, until the trucks left again Tuesday morning.