A man from British Columbia, Canada, proved love knows no bounds—not even rotting compost—when he sifted through 18 tonnes of garbage to recover his wife’s lost wedding rings. The man, identified as Steve Van Ysseldyk, decided to embark on the mission after his wife, Jeannine, accidentally lost her rings.

Jeannine lost her rings on Aug. 14 when she mistakenly spilled popcorn into their garden. While cleaning up, her rings fell into the popcorn bag, which ended up in the compost bin. The couple only realised the rings were missing after the compost was collected.

Determined to get them back, Ysseldyk headed to the local dump the next day. “I was pretty optimistic,” the BBC quoted Ysseldyk as saying.

Despite his wife’s doubts, he believed he could find them. After reviewing his home’s CCTV footage, Ysseldyk identified the exact moment the rings were lost. He also figured out they had been taken to the Mission Sanitary Landfill in British Columbia, which is Canada’s westernmost province.

“My wife was very sceptical. I told her, ‘I’ll go to the dump tomorrow morning and ask [to search the facility]’,” he said.

“And she’s like ‘they’re not gonna let you’,”  Ysseldyk recalled his wife’s words, adding that he wanted to give it a shot anyway.