Aldo Leopold, Sand County Almanac

26 Pages·2011·16.35 MB·English

THE UPSHOT ~' II ,I",I FE IN AMERICAN CULTURE
I !lHld ing roads into lovely country, but of building recep­
repeats the evolutionary history of the race. This is true of
mental as well as physical things. The ~rophy-hunter is th I vlly into the still unlovely human mind.
caveman reborn. Trophy-hunting is the prerogative of youth,
racial or individual, and nothing to apologize for.
The disquieting thing in the modem picture is the trophy­
Wildlife in American Culture
hunter who never grows up, in whom the capacity for
iSQ­
lation, perception, and husbandry is undeveloped, or per­
haps lost. He is the motorized ant who swarms the conti­
nents before learning to see his own back yard, who con­ '1'111, culture of primitive peoples is often based on wild­
sumes but never creates outdoor satisfactions. For him the II f, , Thus the plains Indian not only ate buffalo, but buffalo
recreational engineer dilutes the wilderness and artificializes I rely determined his architecture, dress, language, arts,
II .. ,
its trophies in the fond belief that he is rendering a public l religion.
II II
service. III civilized peoples the cultural base shifts elsewhere, but
The trophy-recreationist has peculiarities that contribute 111( 1 culture nevertheless retains part of its wild roots. I here
in subtle ways to his own undoing. To enjoy he must possess, ils(,llss the value of this wild rootage.
I
invade, appropriate. Hence the wilderness that he cannot Noone can weigh or measure culture, hence I shall waste
personally see has no value to him. Hence the universal as­ liD I ime trying to do so. Suffice it to say that by common con-
sumption that an unused hinterland is rendering no service 1,"lIl of thinking people, there are cultural values in the
to society. To those devoid of imagination, a blank place OIl I,ports, customs, and experiences that renew contacts with
. the map is a useless waste; to others, the most valuable part. wild things. I venture the opinion that these values are of
(Is my share in Alaska worthless to me because I shall never 11lr(~e kinds.
go there? Do I need a road to show me the arctic prairies, li'irst there is value in any experience that reminds us of
the goose pastures of the Yukon, the Kodiak bear, the sheep (1m distinctive national origins and evolution, i.e. that stimu­
meadows behind McKinley?) hil es awareness of history. Such awareness is 'nationalism'
It would appear, in short, that the rudimentary grades of II its best sense. For lack of any other short name, I shall
outdoor recreation consume their resource-base; the higher I'ull this, in our case, the 'split-rail value: For example: a
grades, at least to a degree, create their own satisfactions 1Hly scout has tanned a coonskin cap, and goes Daniel­
with little or no attrition of land or life. It is the expansion I II )oneing in the willow thicket below the tracks. He is re­
('lIacting American history. He is, to that extent, culturally
of transport without a corresponding growth of perception
that threatens us with qualitative bankruptcy of the recre­ Jlrepared to face the dark and bloody realities of the r>resent.
Again: a farmer boy arrives in the schoolroom reeking of
ational process. Recreational development is a job not of
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THE UPSHOT \II LIILl F E IN AMERICAN CULTURE
muskrat; he has tended his traps before breakfast. He is re­ or spike buck for every two legal bucks taken out. In
I II W II,
enacting the romance of the fur trade. Ontogeny repeats , II 111'1' words, approximately half the hunters shoot any deer
phylogeny in sOciety as well as in the individual. ,I,d il a legal deer is killed. The illegal carcasses are left
Second, there is value in any experience that reminds us "II/'f(! they fall. Such deer-hunting is not only without social
of our dependency on the soil-plant-animal-man food chain, but constitutes actual training for ethical depravity
\, 11 1111',
and of the fundamental organization of the biota. Civiliza­ ,·I,·,C'whcre.
tion has so cluttered this elemental man-earth relation with II seems, then, that split-rail and man-earth experiences
gadgets and middlemen that awareness of it is growing dim. I..'VI : zero or plus values, but that ethical experiences may
We fancy that industry supports us, forgetting what sup­ !lil v e! minus values as well.
ports industry. Time was when education moved toward Tllis, then, defines roughly three kinds of cultural nutri­
~oil, not away from it. The nursery jingle about bringing ""'Ill available to our outdoor roots. It does not follow that
home a rabbit skin to wrap the baby bunting in is one of 1'lIllul'e is fed. The extraction of value is never automatic;
many reminders in folk-lore that man once hunted to feed tlllly a healthy culture can feed and grow. Is culture fed by
and clothe his family. present forms of outdoor recreation?
1111 I'
Third, there is value in any experience that exercises those 'I'lle pioneer period gave birth to two ideas that are the
ethical restraints collectively called 'sportsmanship.' OUf 1";sC'llce of split-rail value in outdoor sports. One is the <go­
tools for the pursuit of wildlife improve faster than we do, ligllt' idea, the other the 'one-bullet-one-buck' idea. The
and sportsmanship is a voluntary limitation in the use of I'illllcer went light of necessity. He shot with economy and
these armaments. It is aimed to augment the role of skill I 'ision because he lacked the transport, the cash, and the
JI'(!(
_and shrink the role of gadgets in the pursuit of wild things, \V(':tpons requisite for machine-gun tactics. Let it be clear,
A peculiar virtue in wildlife ethics is that the hunter 111( :n, that in their inception, both of these ideas were forced
ordin~rily has no gallery to applaud or disapprove of his us; we made a virtue of necessity.
1111
condu,ct. Whatever his acts, they are dictated by his own 1n their later evolution, however, they became a code of
conscience, rather than by a mob of onlookers. It is difficult ,'i portsmanship, a self-imposed limitation on sport. On them
to exaggerate the importance of this fact. is based a distinctively American tradition of self-reliance,
Voluntary adherence to an ethical code elevates the self­ II:ll-dihood, woodcraft, and marksmanship/ These are in tan­
respect of the sportsman, but it should not be forgotten that !~ibles, but they are not abstractions. Theodore Roosevelt
voluntary disregard of the code degenerates and depraves was a great sportsman, not because he hung up many
him. For example, a common denominator of all sporting Irophies, but because he expressed this intangible American
codes is not to waste good meat. Yet it is now a demon­ Iradition in words any schoolboy could understand. A more
strable fact that Wisconsin deer-hunters, in their pursuit of subtle and accurate expression is found in the early writings
a legal buck, kill and abandon in the woods at least one doe, of Stewart Edward White. It is not far amiss t9 say that
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THE UPSHOt' iII" II ,I'I.II'E IN AMERICAN CULTURE
IIJ;i1IY clubs. Where is the go-light idea, the one-bullet
such men created cultural value by being aware of it, and by
creating a pattern for its growth. II ,,,Iii ion?
Then came the gadgeteer, otherwise known as the sport­ '1'1 II' answer is not a simple one. Roosevelt did not disdain
ing-goods dealer. He has draped the American outdoorsman 1111 Illodern rifle; White used freely the aluminum pot, the
,if!., le'lll, dehydrated foods. Somehow they used mechanical
with an infinity of contraptions, all offered as aids to self­
reliance, hardihood, woodcraft, or marksmanship, but too " I ,I :~, ill moderation, without being used by them.
often functioning as substitutes for them. Gadgets fill the I do not pretend to know what is moderation, or where
pockets, they dangle from neck and belt. The overflow fills fllC' lille is between legitimate and illegitimate gadgets. It
',I'I'IIIS clear, though, that the origin of gadgets has much to
the auto-trunk, and also the trailer. Each item of outdoor
.III "vith their cultural effects. Homemade aids to sport or
equipment grows lighter and often better, but the aggregate
1IIIIdoor life often enhance, rather than destroy, the man­
poundage becomes tonnage. The traffic in gadgets adds up
"i1r lll drama; he who kills a trout with his own fly has scored
to astronomical sums, which are soberly published as repre­
senting 'the economic value of wildlife.' But what of cultural I we. coups, not one. I use many factory-made gadgets myself.
" '" there must be some limit beyond which money-bought
values?
As an end-case consider the duck-hunter, sitting in a steel ,I ills to sport destroy the cultural value of sport.
Not all sports have degenerated to the same extent as
boat behind composition decoys. A put-put motor has
cllwk-hunting. Defenders of the American tradition still
brought him to the blind without exercise. Canned heat
, xisl. Perhaps the bow-and-arrow movement and the revival
stands by to warm him in case of a chilling wind. He talks
III falconry mark the beginnings of a reaction. The net trend,
to the passing flocks on a factory caller, in what he hopes are
III )wcver, is clearly toward more and more mechanization,
seductive tones; home lessons from a phonograph record
"vilh a corresponding shrinkage in cultural values, especially
have taught him how. The decoys work, despite the caller; a
~plit-r<1il values and ethical restraints.
flock circles in. It must be shot at before it circles twice, for
J have the impression that the American sportsman is ,
the marsh bristles with other sportsmen, similarly accoutred,
JlII'/.Zled; he doesn't understand what is happening to him.
who might shoot first. He opens up at 70 yards, for his poly­
Bigger and better gadgets are good for industry, so why not
choke is set for infinity, and the advertisements have told
outdoor recreation? It has not dawned' on him that out­
1'1)),
him that Super-Z shells, and plenty of them, have a long
doo]' recreations are essentially primitive, atavistic; that their
reach. The flock flares. A couple of cripples scale off to die value is a contrast-value; that excessive mechanization de­
elsewhere. Is this sportsman absorbing cultural value? Or is ,~l roys contrasts by moving the factory to the woods or to the
he just feeding minks? The next blind opens up at 75 yards;
1I1<11'sh.
how else is a fellow to get some shooting? This is duck shoot­ The sportsman has no leaders to tell him what is wrong.
ing, current model. It is typical of all public grounds, and The sporting press no longer represents sport; it has turned
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THE UPSHOT ,I I,"WI': IN AMERICAN CULTURE
billboard for the gadgeteer. Wildlife administrators are too I" 1" :III('cl or given as a personal courtesy. But to hawk it in
busy producing something to shoot at to worry much about 11 \\ , 111:lrkctplace of the sports column as an aid to circulation
the cultural value of the shooting. Because everybody from i 'III:: 10 me another matter. To hand it to all and sundry
Xenophon to Teddy Roosevelt said sport has value, it is II I I" 'I ~ public 'service' seems to me distinctly another mat­
assumed that this value must be indestructible. h I. I<ven 'conservation' departments now tell Tom, Dick,
Among non-gunpowder sports, the impact of mechaniza­ ,11101 Ihrry where the fish are biting, and where a flock of
tion has had diverse effects. The modern field glass, camera, dlll'ks has ventured to alight for a meal.
and the aluminum bird-band have certainly rwt deteriorated 1\ 11 o( these organized promiscuities tend to depersonalize
the cultural value of ornithology. Fishing, but for outboard 1111 11 IIi' the essentially personal elements in outdoor sports. I
motors and aluminum canoes, seems less severely mecha­ d'l Illlt know where the line lies between legitimate and
nized than hunting. On the other hand, motorized transport 111" !', llimate practice; I am convinced, though, that 'where­
has nearly destroyed the sport of wilderness travel by leav­ I" 1'1)' service has broken all bounds of reason.
ii
ing only fly-specks of wilderness to travel in. IIIC hunting or fishing is good, the 'where-to-go' service
Fox-hunting with hounds, backwoods style, presents a jl dliCTS to attract the desired excess of sportsmen. But if it is
dramatic instance of partial and perhaps harmless mecha­ '.11 !,ood the advertiser must resort to more forcible means.
nized invasion. This is one of the purest of sports; it has real I )1.;Is1Ieil is the fishing lottery, in which a few hatchery fish
split-rail flavor; it has man-earth drama of the first water. III II lagged, and a prize is offered for the fisherman catching
The fox is deliberately left unshot, hence ethical restraint till willning number. This curious hybrid between the tech­
is also present. But we now follow the chase in Fords! The 1I111"C,~ of science and of the pool hall insures the aver­
voice of Bugle Ann mingles with the honk of the flivver! 1I1,llillg of many an already exhausted lake, and brings a glow
However, no one is likely to invent a mechanical foxhound, 1'1' civic pride to many a village Chamber of Commerce.
or to screw a polychoke on the hound's nose. No one is likely II is idle for the profeSSional wildlife managers to consider
1III'1I1sdves aloof from these affairs. The production engineer
to teach dog-training by phonograph, or by other painless
shortcuts. I think the gadgeteer has reached the end of his 1' 1)(1 the salesman belong to the same company; both are
tether in dogdom. (1I 1'I'I,d with the same stick.
Wildlife managers are trying to raise game in the wild
It is not quite accurate to ascribe all the ills of sport to the
I. ' Ill:1I1ipulating its environment, and thus to convert hunt­
inventor of physical aids-to-sport. The advertiser invents
III' from exploitation to cropping. If the conversion takes
ideas, and ideas are seldom as honest as physical objects,
pllll'c, how will it affect cultural values? It must be admitted
even though they may be equally useless. One such deserves
Illat split-rail flavor and free-for-all exploitation are his­
special mention: the 'where-to-go' department. Knowledge
IlIlically associated. Daniel Boone had scant patience with
of the whereabouts of good hunting or fishing is a very per­
Ii ) ~ricultural cropping, let alone wildlife cropping. Perhaps
sonal form of property. It is like rod, dog, or gun: a thing to
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THE UPSHOT \1 ,11','1"1-: IN AMERICAN CULTURE
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the stubborn reluctance of the 'one-gallus' sportsman to be \,v ildlife research started as a profeSSional priestcraft. The
converted to the cropping idea is an expression of his split­ ,""14 ' difficult and laborious research problems must doubt­
rail inheritance. Probably cropping is resisted because it is II ~Ij 1('lIlain in profeSSional hands, but there are plenty of
incompatible with one component of the split-rail tradition: I 1,,1 ii,'ms suitable for all grades of amateurs. In the :field of
free hunting. 1I,."I':lllical invention research has long since spread to ama­
Mechanization offers no cultmal substitute for the split­ II III ::. In the biological :field the sport-value of amateur re­
rail values it destroys; at least none visible to me. Cropping "1\1, ·1, is just beginning to be realized.
or management does offer a substitute, which to me has at TilliS Margaret Morse Nice, an amateur ornithologist,
least equal value: wild husbandry. The experience of man­ II,dic<l song sparrows in her back yard. She has become a
aging land for wildlife crops has the same value as any other WllrI<l-authority on bird behavior, and has out-thought and
form of farming; it is a reminder of the man-earth relation. worked many a professional student of social organiza­
III "
Moreover ethical restraints are involved; thus managing ! lill ill birds. Charles L. Broley, a banker, banded eagles for
game without resorting to predator-control calls for ethical 11111. He discovered a hitherto unknown fact: that some
restraint of a high order. It may be concluded, then, that 1'1',Ic:s nest in the South in winter, and then go vacationing
I
game cropping shrinks one value (split-rail) but enhances III Ille north woods. Norman and Stuart Criddle, wheat
both of the others. IIIH'hcrs on the Manitoba prairies, studied the fauna and
If we regard outdoor sports as a :field of conflict between nlll;t of their farm, and became recognized authorities on
an immensely vigorous process of mechanization and a PI"'rylhing from local botany to wildlife cycles. Elliott S.
wholly static tradition, then the outlook for cultural values 11 11 1kcr, a cowman in the New Mexico mountains, has writ­
is indeed dark. But why cannot our concept of sport grow 1",11 olle of the two best books on that elusive cat: the moun­
with the same vigor as our list of gadgets? Perhaps the sal­
Ill ill lion. Do not let anyone tell you that these people made
vation of cultural value lies in seizing the offensive. I, for
\V'lIl out of play. They simply realized that the most fun lies
one, believe that the time is ripe. Sportsmen can determine
,dng and studying the unknown.
'! ,'; ,
for themselves the shape of things to come.
(hllithology, mammalogy, and botany, as now known to
The last decade, for example, has disclosed a totally new
IIII1SI amateurs, are but kindergarten games compared with
form of sport, which does not destroy wildlife, which uses
v hat is possible for (and open to) amateurs in these :fields.
gadgets without being used by them, which outflanks the
()lle reason for this is that the whole structure of biological
problem of posted land, and which greatly increases the
,·dllcation (including education in wildlife) is aimed to per­
human carrying capacity of a unit area. This sport knows no
I'dllate the profeSSional monopoly on research. To the ama­
bag limit, no closed season. It needs teachers, but not
II;m are allotted only make-believe voyages of discovery, to
wardens. It calls for a new woodcraft of the highest cultural
vmify what professional authority already knows. What the
value. The sport I refer to is wildlife research.
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THE UPSHOT
, " ""WE IN AMERICAN CULTURE
youth needs to be told is that a ship is a-building in his own I'llis state of doubt about the fundamentals of human
mental dry dock, a ship with freedom of the seas.
1" 'p"lation behavior lends exceptional interest, and excep­
In my opinion, the promotion of wildlife research sports I r, 111.11 value, to the only available analogue: the higher
is the most important job confronting the profession of wild­ il IIIIII:tlS. Errington, among others, has pointed out the cul­
life management. Wildlife has still another value, now visible 11 11 .1 value of these animal analogues. For centuries this
only to a few ecologists, but of potential importance to the II Ii J >J"<uy of knowledge has been inaccessible to us because
, I
whole human enterprise. \ I diel not know where or how to look for it. Ecology is now
We now know that animal populations have behavior 1" III, llillg us to search in animal populations for analogies to
patterns of which the individual animal is unaware, but problems. By learning how some small part of the
11 '11 II\V11
which he nevertheless helps to execute. Thus the rabbit is II ,,1,1 ticks, we can guess how the whole mechanism ticks.
unaware of cycles, but he is the vehicle for cycles. I II' ahility to perceive these deeper meanings, and to ap­
We cannot discern these behavior patterns in the indi­ 1'111 i:;1 ~ them critically, is the woodcraft of the future.
vidual, or in short periods of time. The most intense scrutiny , I 'I I sum up, wildlife once fed us and shaped our culture.
of an individual rabbit tells us nothing of cycles. The cycle II :;1 ill yields us pleasure for leisure hours, but we try to
concept springs from a scrutiny of the mass through decades. " II I' ll\at pleasure by modern machinery and thus destroy
This raises the disquieting question: do human popula­ 1, 1111 of its value. Reaping it by modern mentality would
tions have behavior patterns of which we are unaware, but \ ,·1,1. [lot only pleasure, but wisdom as well.
which we help to execute? Are mobs and wars, unrests and
revolutions, cut of such cloth?
Many historians and philosophers persist in interpreting
our mass behaviors as the collective result of individual acts
of volition. The whole subject matter of diplomacy assumes
that the political group has the properties of an honorable
person. On the other hand, some economists see the whole
of society as a plaything for processes, our knowledge of
which is largely ex post facto.
It is reasonable to suppose that our social processes have
a higher volitional content than those of the rabbit, but it
is also reasonable to suppose that we, as a species, contain
population behavior patterns of which nothing is known
because circumstance has never evoked them. We may have
others the meaning of which we have misread.
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., 1111,llN J':SS
THE UPSHOT
The Remnants
~ l llll l' Ill' the diverse wildernesses out of which we have ham­
Wilderness
III It,d America are already gone; hence in any practical
IJI t J',I IlIU the unit areas to be preserved must vary greatly in
I in degree of wildness.
" 11 11<
Wilderness is the raw material out of which man has ham­ Nil living man will see again the long-grass prairie, where
mered the artifact called civilization. " "II Ill' prairie flowers lapped at the stirmps of the pioneer.
Wilderness was never a homogeneous raw material. It was V" ::hall do well to find a forty here and there on which
very diverse, and the resulting artifacts are very diverse. iI" I'l'airie plants can be kept alive as species. There were a
These differences in the end-product are known as cultures. I il"olrcd such plants, many of exceptional beauty. Most of
The rich diversity of the world's cultures reflects a corre­ lil' 'I 11 ;lrc quite unknown to those who have inherited their
sponding diversity in the wilds that gave them birth. d' lillil ill.
For the first time in ~he history of the human species, two Bill the short-grass prairie, where Cabeza de Vaca saw
changes are now impending. One is the exhaustion of wilder­ II ". 1H Irizon under the bellies of the buffalo, is still extant in
ness in the more habitable portions of the globe. The other II I" w spots of lO,OOO-acre size, albeit severely chewed up by
is the world-wide hybridization of cultures through modern !""'II, cattle, and dry-farmers. If the forty-niners are worth
transport and industrialization. Neither can be prevented, , ''IllllIcmorating on the walls of state capitols, is not the
and perhaps should not be, but the question arises whether, " "111 1 of their mighty hegira worth commemorating in sev­
by some slight amelioration of the impending changes, cer­ " 111 1 lIational prairie reservations?
the coastal prairie there is one block in Florida, and
tain values can be preserved that would otherwise be lost. ()I'
To the laborer in the sweat of his labor, the raw stuff on 1'1'" ill Texas, but oil we~ls, onion fields, and citrus groves
I,losing in, armed to the teeth with drills and bulldozers.
his anvil is an adversary to be conquered. So was wilderness li n
an adversary to the pioneer. II i ,~ last call.
Nil living man wi1l see again the virgin pineries of the
But to the laborer in repose, able for the moment to cast a
philosophical eye on his world, that same raw stuff is some­ I, .I,,: States, or the flatwoods of the coastal plain, or the
hardwoods; of these, samples of a few acres each will
thing to be loved and cherished, because it gives definition " II l1l
and meaning to his life. This is a plea for the preservation of I. Ivn to suffice. But there are still several blocks of maple­
h"llilock of thousand-acre size; there are similar blocks of
some tag-ends of wilderness, as museum pieces, for the edifi­
Ap palachian hardwoods, of southern hardwood swamp, of
cation of those who may one day wish to see, feel, or study
'press swamp, and of Adirondack spmce. Few of these
the origins of their cultural inheritance. I'
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lag-c'lIds {Ire ; SC'C'lIrC' rrellil 1'1(I:qll '( '1 ' r c'"I1" " . !lI n l I" V, 11111 1 1111111.1, 11,,11111',':1. hy slow d(!grc~cs, h'come
still from prospct.:livc~ LOlli isl l'Iliids. III) I 1\ \ " Irll, (:(:(: C'Ill IIJls pre 'sell tecl a widespread
or
One of the fastcst-slirillkilllf c':llc'l'mi,,,'l wild"IIIr '," IIHII III 11I 1 1.1 II<'W 11 1111 oflcllllceJlcss roads. Lumber
tel ,.
coastlines. Cottages ancI tOllrist m:Hls 11:1\ Ill :&11 III II 11 1111 dill II ', 1111 W: I I" ,L";: IVC the impetus of military neces­
hilated wild coasts on both occallS, ancl 1.al c SIIIlC'ri"l' III III \ I I 111.1 "xlc'lIsiOIlS, legitimate and otherwise. At
now losing the last large remnant of wiM sllon~lill(' ')11 1111 I "I 111'"111'111, sl,i-tows and ski-hotels are being pro­
Great Lakes. No single Idnd of wilderness is mow illl illl:1i "I" III (IIIII\, 1IIIIIIIIIain areas, often without regard to
interwoven with history, and none nearcr the poillt of C'(1I11 II III Iii ,I,·' ,',II:tlIIlJl as wilderness.
plete disappearance. II' •• 1 111/1 Il\lls l illsidious invasions of wilderness is via
In all of North America east of the Rockies, therc is olll}' I 111\ • 11111101. II works thus: wolves and lions are cleaned
one large area formally reserved as a wilderness: the QII( ' II '\ I ld, , \tIl ~ss area in the interest of big-game manage­
tieo-Superior International Park in Minnesota and Ont-arlo. 11., I .i~-gamc herds (usually deer or elk) then in­
This magnificent block of canoe-country, a mosaic of lal C"; , I I,) 1111 !,oint of overbrowsing the range. Hunters must
and rivers, lies mostly in Canada, and can be about as 1nr~t I III ""('Iluraged to harvest the surplus, but modern
as Canada chooses to make it, but its integrity is threatcn ,c1 1,,111 1• II (( .fw:c~ to operate far from a car; hence a road must
by two recent developments: the growth of fishing resorl:; 1" .111 III !'rovide access to the surplus game. Again and
served by pontoon-equipped airplanes, and a jurisdictiol1(1'l ,, iII "I, W lc1I'1'IlCSS areas have been split by this process, but
dispute whether the Minnesota end of the area shall be all
('PliliII1lCS.
National Forest, or partly State Forest. The whole region is II" I\ ucky Mountain system of wilderness areas covers a
in danger of power impoundments, and this regrettabl ' .III ",lIllIot of forest types, from the juniper breaks of th~
cleavage among proponents of wilderness may end in giving II l1 tll\V"'~ 1' to the 'illimitable woods where rolls the Oregon.
power the whip-hand. II 1(lI'king, however, in desert areas, probably because ~f
In the Rocky Mountain states, a score of areas in the Na­ j lit IIl1der-aged brand of esthetics which limits the defim­
tional Forests, varying in size from a hundred thousand to til" or 'scenery' to lakes a:rid pine trees.
half a million acres, are withdrawn as wilderness, and closed III ':lIlada and Alaska there are still large expanses of
to roads, hotels, and other inimical uses. In the National
country
• I }'. II f
Parks the same principle is recognized, but no specific bound­
Where nameless men by nameless rivers wander
aries are delimited. Collectively, these federal areas are the
and in strange valleys die strange deaths alone.
backbone of the wilderness program, but they are not so
secure as the paper record might lead one to believe. Local A representative series of these areas can, and should, ~e
pressures for new tourist roads knock off a chip here and a k"pt. Many are of negligible or negative value for economIC
slab there. There is perennial pressure for extension of roads lise. It win be contended, of course, that no deliberate plan­
[ 190] [ 191]
THE UPSHOT
ning to this end is necessary; that adequate areas will sur­ I" I, IT!' Lhem, however, are as American as a hickory tree;
vive anyhow. All recent history belies so comforting an as­ III \ Il!lvn been copied elsewhere, but they were developed
sumption. Even if wild spots do survive, what of their fauna? I( It; I 11111 perfection only on this continent. One of these
The woodland caribou, the several races of mountain sheep, I . 111'"'' tr:lvel, and the other is travel by pack-train. Both
the pure form of woods buffalo, the barren ground grizzly, II> "I.. illking rapidly. Your Hudson Bay Indian now has a
the freshwater seals, and the whales are even now threat­ I" I 1'"1 , and your mountaineer a Ford. If I had to make a
ened. Of what use are wild areas destitute of their distinc­ I I " , I'y canoe or packhorse, I should likely do likewise,
tive faunas? The recently organized Arctic Institute has I Ii III ,I II are grueling labor. But we who seek wilderness
embarked on the industtialization of the Arctic wastes, with I \ ' ,f I()I' sport are foiled when we are forced to compete
excellent chances of enough success to ruin them as wilder­ I I, II l1'chanized substitutes. It is footless to execute a por­
i \ the tune of motor launches, or to turn out your bell­
ness. It is last call, even in the Far North. 11 'II
To what extent Canada and Alaska will be able to see and Ill! " ill the pasture of a summer hotel. It is better to stay
grasp their opportunities is anybody's guess. Pioneers usu­ 111 11 1"'.
\V Idnness areas are first of all a series of sanctuaries

ally scoff at any effort to perpetuate pioneering.
IIII IIII' primitive arts of wilderness travel, especially canoe-

packing. .
II " IIlId
Wilderness for Recreation I i.1 lppose some will wish to debate whether it is important
tI ' 11'1 'p these primitive arts alive. I shall not debate it.
Physical combat for the means of subsistence was, for un­
II, If11'1' you know it in your bones, or you are very, very old.
numbered centuries, an economic fact. When it disappeared
jl',lIl'Opean hunting and fishing are largely devoid of the
as such, a sound instinct led us to preserve it in the form of
II II I~ that wilderness areas might be the means of preserving
athletic sports and games.
I., li ds country. Europeans d~ not camp, cook, or do their
Physical combat between men and beasts was, in like
work in the woods if they can avoid doing so. Work
l o \' ll
manner, an economic fact, now preserved as hunting and
are delegated to beaters and servants, and a hunt
1 11"lt'S
fishing for sport.
, IIi \' I ~S the atmosphere of a picnic, rather than of pioneering.
Public wilderness areas are, first of all, a means of per­
'Illi l Il ~st of skill is confined largely to the actual taking of .
petuating, in sport form, the more virile and primitive skills
,'.11I1l or fish.
in pioneering travel and subsistence.
' 1'Itt ~re are those who decry wilderness sports as <undemo­
Some of these skills are of generalized distribution; the
'1I11! .. because the recreational carrying capacity of a wil­
details have been adapted to the American scene, but the
dc ' I'I\( ~SS is small, as compared with a golf links Pi' a tourist
skill is world-wide. Hunting, fishing, and foot travel by pack The basic error in such argument is that it applies the
1'1 11I1p .
are examples. pid\osophy of mass-production to what is intended to coun­
[ 192] [ 193]
THE UPSHOT WILDERNESS
ract mass-production. The value of recreation is not a reHected in the fact that our treatments for them are still
matter of ciphers. Recreation is valuable in proportion to the prevailingly local. Thus when a soil loses fertility we pour on
intensity of its experiences, and to the degree to which it fertilizer, or at best alter its tame flora and fauna, without
differs from and contrasts with workaday life. By these cri­ considering the fact that its wild flora and fauna, which
teria, mechanized outings are at best a milk-and-water affair. built the soil to begin with, may likewise be important to
Mechanized recreation already has seized nine-tenths of its maintenance. It was recently discovered, for example,
the woods and mountains; a decent respect for minorities that good tobacco crops depend, for some unknown reason,
should dedicate the other tenth to wilderness. on the preconditioning of the soil by wild ragweed. It does
not occur to us that such unexpected chains of dependency
may have wide prevalence in nature.
Wilderness for Science When prairie dogs, ground squirrels, or mice increase to
The most important characteristic of an organism is that pest levels we poison them, but we do not look beyond the
capacity for internal self-renewal known as health. animal to find the cause of the irruption. We assume that
animal troubles must have animal causes. The latest scien­
There are two organisms whose processes of self-renewal
tific evidence points to derangements of the plant com­
have been subjected to human interference and control. One
munity as the real seat of rodent irruptions, but few explora­
of these is man himself (medicine and public health). The
tions of this clue are being made.
other is land (agriculture and conservation).
Many forest plantations are producing one-log or two-log
The effort to control the health of land has not been very
trees on soil which originally grew three-log and four-log
successful. It is now generally understood that when soil
trees. Why? Thinking foresters know that the cause prob­
loses fertility, or washes away faster than it forms, and
ably lies not in the tree, but in the micro-flora of the soil,
when water systems exhibit abnormal floods and shortages,
and that it may take more years to restore the soil flora than
the land is sick.
it took to destroy it. ­
Other derangements are known as facts, but are not yet
Many conservation treatments are obviously superficial.
thought of as symptoms of land sickness. The disappear­
Flood-control dams have no relation to the cause of floods.
ance of plants and animal species without visible cause,
Check dams and terraces do not touch the 'cause of erosion.
despite efforts to protect them, and the irruption of others
Refuges and hatcheries to maintain the supply of game and
as pests despite efforts to control them, must, in the absence
fish do not explain why the supply fails to maintain itself.
of simpler explanations, be reganled as symptoms of sick­
In general, the trend of the evidence indicates that in
ness in the land organism. Both are occurring too frequently
land, just as in the human body, the symptoms may lie in
to be dismissed as normal evolutionary events.
one organ and the cause in another. The practices we now
The status of thought on these ailments of the land is
call conservation are, to a large extent, local alleviations of
[ 194]
( 195J