Many people were outside for Memorial Day weekend, and even though some visitors from other states were seen crowding the beaches in northern Indiana, the Department of Natural Resources wants you to know that you can do your part to keep the outdoors safe for everyone.

“All Hoosiers have experienced a need to get outside to help cope with our current COVID-19 situations,” said Elizabeth Middleton, with the Indiana Dept. of Natural Resources, on Indiana Outdoors Radio.

She’s in charge of an outreach program to encourage people to use state properties safely and to keep the wildlife safe and healthy.

“To have so much public land distributed across the state for Hoosiers to find refuge and maybe reconnect with activities or things they haven’t had time to do before has really been a special thing.”

Middleton said keeping wildlife safe can be as simple as picking up your trash.

“You can carry out your trash, which helps keep all of our public lands more beautiful to enjoy,” she said. Middleton suggested taking your extra grocery bags along to put trash in.

“Just tucking a few in your tackle box or your back pocket before you head out ensures you take responsibility for your own trash and if you see other trash along the way and pick that up then you’re doing a really important thing,” said Middleton.

She said other measures to keep people and animals safe on state properties include shooting only in designated areas.

“You can choose to practice social distancing, choose to park only in designated areas. We can choose to drive only at safe speeds when we’re on property roads.”