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Aldo Leopold

Aldo Leopold Quotes

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Famous Aldo Leopold Quotes

“The last word in ignorance is the man who says of an animal or plant, "What good is it?" If the land mechanism as a whole is good, then every part is good, whether we understand it or not. If the biota, in the course of aeons, has built something we like but do not understand, then who but a fool would discard seemingly useless parts? To keep every cog and wheel is the first precaution of intelligent tinkering.”

IfsMenFirstsWholeLastsCoursesAnimalLandIgnoranceFoolBuiltIntelligentPlantUselessWheelsMechanismLast WordsPrecautionCogsTinkeringLand Conservation
Book:Round River
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“One of the penalties of an ecological education is that one lives alone in a world of wounds. Much of the damage inflicted on land is quite invisible to laymen. An ecologist must either harden his shell and make believe that the consequences of science are none of his business, or he must be the doctor who sees the marks of death in a community that believes itself well and does not want to be told otherwise.”

WorldWantBelieveWellsDoeCommunityLandConsequenceDoctorsMarkWoundsInvisibleDamageShellsPenaltiesDoctor WhoEcologicalMake BelieveNature And EnvironmentLaymanLand Conservation
Book:Round River
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“Tell me of what plant-birthday a man takes notice, and I shall tell you a good deal about his vocation, his hobbies, his hay fever, and the general level of his ecological education.”

MenLevelsDealsPlantHobbiesVocationFeverEcologicalHayHay Fever
Book:Aldo Leopold: A Sand County Almanac & Other Writings on Conservation and Ecology: (Library of America #238)
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“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.”

MeanEyeYoungDiesViewsKnownWatchesFireSeeingDyingMountainGreenI RealizedParadiseSomething NewFewerHuntingFierceHer EyesConservationHuntersTriggersDeerLand Conservation
Author:Aldo Leopold
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“But wherever the truth may lie, this much is crystal-clear: our bigger-and-better society is now like a hypochondriac, so obsessed with its own economic health as to have lost the capacity to remain healthy. . . . Nothing could be more salutary at this stage than a little healthy contempt for a plethora of material blessings.”

MayLittlesLyingLostClearEconomicStageMaterialsHealthyBlessingCapacityBiggerObsessedContemptCrystalsBigger And BetterHypochondriac
Book:Aldo Leopold: A Sand County Almanac & Other Writings on Conservation and Ecology: (Library of America #238)
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“This whole effort to rebuild and stabilize a countryside is not without its disappointments and mistakes... What matter though these temporary growing pains when one can cast his eye upon the hills and see hard-boiled farmers who have spent their lives destroying land now carrying water by hand to their new plantations”

MatterHardWholeHandsEyePainWaterEffortMistakeGrowingLandCastsDisappointmentHillsHis EyesTemporaryFarmersDestroyingWhat MattersCountrysidePlantationsGrowing Pains
Book:For the Health of the Land: Previously Unpublished Essays And Other Writings
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“To those who know the speech of hills and rivers straightening a stream is like shipping vagrants—a very successful method of passing trouble from one place to the next. It solves nothing in any collective sense.”

KnowsNextSuccessfulTroubleSpeechRiversMethodSolvePassingPassingsHillsStreamsCollectivesShippingVagrants
Book:The River of the Mother of God: and other Essays by Aldo Leopold
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“Like winds and sunsets, wild things were taken for granted until progress began to do away with them. Now we face the question whether a still higher 'standard of living' is worth its cost in things natural, wild and free. For us of the minority, the opportunity to see geese is more important than television.”

StillsImportantFacesOpportunityNatureNaturalTakenProgressTelevisionWindHigherCostStandardsGrantedSunsetMinoritiesConservationGeeseStandards Of LivingTaken For GrantedWild And FreeWild ThingsHigher StandardsLand Conservation
Book:A Sand County Almanac, and Sketches Here and There
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“Acts of creation are ordinarily reserved for gods and poets, but humbler folk may circumvent this restriction if they know how. To plant a pine, for example, one need be neither god nor poet; one need only own a shovel. By virtue of this curious loophole in the rules, any clodhopper may say: Let there be a tree - and there will be one.”

IfsKnowsNeedsMayKnow HowVirtueTreeExampleCreationPoetPlantFolksCuriousRestrictionReservedShovelsLoopholes
Book:A Sand County Almanac
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“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?”

MenMayCountryYoungGladSpotsFortyWildernessMapsBlankPioneersBe YoungLand Conservation
Book:A Sand County Almanac: And Sketches Here and There
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“High horns, low horns, silence, and finally a pandemonium of trumpets, rattles, croaks, and cries that almost shakes the bog with its nearness ... A new day has begun on the crane marsh. A sense of time lies thick and heavy on such a place ... Our ability to perceive quality in nature begins, as in art, with the pretty. It expands through successive stages of the beautiful to values as yet uncaptured by language.”

ArtBeautifulLyingValuesLanguageNatureAbilitySilenceQualityStageCryLowsHeavyPerceiveShakesThickHornsNew DayTrumpetsMarshesCranesBogsPandemonium
Author:Aldo Leopold
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“All ethics so far evolved rest upon a single premise: that the individual is a member of a community of interdependent parts. . . The land ethic simply enlarges the boundaries of the community to include soils, waters, plants, and animals, or collectively: the land.”

IndividualWaterCommunityAnimalLandMembersEthicsPlantBoundariesSoilPremisesInterdependencePlants And Animals
Book:A Sand County Almanac: And Sketches Here and There
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