Aldo Leopold

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Aldo Leopold Throughout Fire Season by Philip Connors, the name Aldo Leopold is brought up in text multiple times. Not knowing who or what this name meant it interested me to why this name was such an important figure in Connors life as a fire watchmen. Connors holds a very high praise for this name and when brought up in the book he talks about some of the great contributions Aldo has made for the wilderness conservation movement. “He (Aldo Leopold) developed an influential argument in favor of wilderness with profound effects on the American landscape, some of them felt most tangibly on the stretch of country outside my window” (Connors, 11). This quote by Connors is just one of the many times that Aldo’s work is recognized as he sits in …show more content…

Aldo Leopold spent more than half of his career studying to understand the way that public lands could be manipulated and blend the lands together even across human-placed boundaries. Leopold owned a sand farm in the southern part of the United States where he conducted his research on the flow of nutrients, weeds, and wildlife. After years of research he was able to conclude the ways that plants and wildlife were able to cross the administrative lines that separated him from his neighbors. This later led Leopold to believe that lines could be dimmed across these set boundaries. “It is a fact, patent both to my dog and myself, that at daybreak I am the sole owner of all acres I can walk over. It is not only boundaries that disappear but also the thought of being bounded” (Leopold 1966, 41). This quote does a remarkable job of describing what Leopold believed in and what he based his work ethic off. That land should not be bounded to one individual, and that land should be able to be discovered, traveled, and seen by all that want to witness. There should be no such thing as boundaries on the beauty of this world. This quote also connects to the way that Connors feels about Leopold. As Connors sits in his office a hundred feet in the air overlooking the beauty of the land that Leopold himself set aside almost a decade before, Connors describes what can be seen. The mountain peaks that couldn 't be counted on one hand, the multiple national forests combined together, and all the beauty that lies in between. Everything set aside because of the reason Leopold described in the quote above, to be explored by all, not one (Knight L. Richard, and Suzanne Riedel, 37). Aldo Leopold was born for the forest some say, born in