A Land Ethic – Susan Feathers

When we see land as a community to which we belong, we may begin to use it with love and respect. ~ Aldo Leopold, The Land Ethic

Trump is now siting public lands, lands which belong to all of us, our National Parks, refuges and places where we recreate, hunt, find inspiration – as resources for sale (oil, minerals, etc.).

Here is a short but informative interview by Heather Cox Richardson with Wes Siler about what is at risk.

In the quote below the title of this post, I provide a link to the Aldo Leopold Foundation in Wisconsin which continues the legacy of Leopold, one of America’s most brilliant writers about land as a community to which we belong. A park ranger, a scientist, a professor and a hunter – Leopold has given Americans a treasure of wisdom about managing public lands and about how we value and understand the natural treasures which give us life.

In 2013, I attended the Land Ethic Leader training at the Foundation. Inspired, I returned to my home in Pensacola, Florida and gave presentations about the Land Ethic and what we can learn from it. IT IS THE ANTIDOTE TO TRUMP’S IDEA THAT LAND IS A COMMODITY TO BE BOUGHT AND SOLD.

The Land Ethic_A Sand County Almanac Download

“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.”
Aldo Leopold, A Land Ethic

“Conservation is getting nowhere because it is incompatible with our Abrahamic concept of land. We abuse land because we regard it as a commodity belonging to us. When we see land as a community to which we belong, we may begin to use it with love and respect.” ~ Aldo Leopold

When I was 13, my family moved to Plattsburg, New York. We rented a model home built at the edge of the forest surrounding St. Bellarmine College and Noviate. It was housed in what had been the 2nd Hotel Champlain and surrounding grounds with trails winding down to Lake Champlain.

When I left our home, I walked on the monastery trails toward the lake with our family beagle who loved exploring the grounds with nose and long velvet ears with which he breathed in the fragrances of the woods and touched the rocks and trails sensing creatures who had passed by.

I was pensive on this day. Military families, as we were, suffer trauma through moving which separates children and youth from new found friends and causes stress in parents through absense of the father or mother, and often living in less than ideal housing and circumstances. I longed to belong somewhere.

It was fall in the Adirondacks and the woods were aflame in nature’s palette of red, gold, purple, orange and yellow. I stopped in a spot ablaze with autumn leaves which appeared as a mosaic. As I stared into its palette, I became aware that I was becoming a part of the wholeness of it. At that moment “I” no longer existed. I was lifted out of body.

This realization of the oneness of life in varying forms, colors and beingness profoundly changed me. At 13 I realized there is no separation between the “natural world” and me nor any other life form. We are part of a living mosaic moving through space on a spinning planet.

After that seminal day, I have felt that I belonged, wherever I may be; I draw no distinction between myself and the mosaic of life around me. And now, wherever I live, I belong. This has brought me great peace and satisfaction. Desert, mountains, grasslands, tropical zones – I’ve lived in each one loving it and learning from the people and the land, waters, and all the life there.