Aldo Leopold
Aldo Leopold
American author, scientist, ecologist, forester, environmentalist
(1887-1948)
“We reached the old wolf in time to watch a fierce green fire dying in
her eyes. I realized then, and have known ever since, that there was
something new to me in those eyes – something known only to her and to the
mountain. I was young then, and full of trigger-itch; I thought that because
fewer wolves meant more deer, that no wolves would mean hunters’ paradise.
But after seeing the green fire die, I sensed that neither the wolf nor the
mountain agreed with such a view.”
“Only the mountain has lived long enough to listen objectively to the
howl of the wolf.”
“Nonconformity is the highest evolutionary attainment of social animals.”
“Man always kills the thing he loves, and so we the pioneers have killed our wilderness. Some say we had to. Be that as it may, I am glad I shall never be young without wild country to be young in. Of what avail are forty freedoms without a blank spot on the map?”
“There are some who can live without wild things and some who cannot.”
“Examine each question in terms of what is ethically and aesthetically right, as well as what is economically expedient. A thing is right when it tends to perserve the integrity, stability, and beauty of the biotic community. It is wrong when it tends otherwise.”
“The last word in ignorance is the man who says of an animal or plant: 'What good is it?”
