I Have Read Many Definitions Of What

One Of The Anomalies Of Modern Ecology Is The Creation Of Two Groups, Each Of Which Seems Barely Aware Of The Existence Of The Other. The One Studies The Human Community, Almost As If It Were A Separate Entity, And Calls Its Findings Sociology, Economics And History. The Other Studies The Plant And Animal Community And Comfortably Relegates The Hodge-podge Of Politics To The Liberal Arts. The Inevitable Fusion Of These Two Lines Of Thought Will, Perhaps, Constitute The Outstanding Advance Of This Century.

Conservation Viewed In Its Entirety, Is The Slow And Laborious Unfolding Of A New Relationship Between People And Land.

He Who Hopes For Spring With Upturned Eye Never Sees So Small A Thing As Draba. He Who Despairs Of Spring With Downcast Eye Steps On It, Unknowing. He Who Searches For Spring With His Knees In The Mud Finds It, In Abundance.

Then Came The Gadgeteer, Otherwise Known As The Sporting-goods Dealer. He Has Draped The American Outdoorsman With An Infinity Of Contraptions, All Offered As Aids To Self-reliance, Hardihood, Woodcraft, Or Marksmanship, But Too Often Functioning As Substitutes For Them. Gadgets Fill The Pockets, They Dangle From Neck And Belt. The Overflow Fills The Auto-trunk And Also The Trailer. Each Item Of Outdoor Equipment Grows Lighter And Often Better, But The Aggregate Poundage Becomes Tonnage.

Every Region Should Retain Representative Samples Of Its Original Or Wilderness Condition, To Serve Science As A Sample Of Normality. Just As Doctors Must Study Healthy People To Understand Disease, So Must The Land Sciences Study The Wilderness To Understand Disorders Of The Land-mechanism.