Quote

If we lose our wilderness, we have nothing left worth fighting for.

Aldo Leopold

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Aldo Leopold
Age: 60 †
Born: 1887
Born: January 1
Died: 1948
Died: January 1
Academic
Author
Botanical Collector
Ecologist
Environmentalist
Forestry Scientist
Naturalist
Philosopher
University Teacher
Burlington
Iowa
Aldo Starker Leopold
Rand Aldo Leopold
Fighting
Left
Nothing
Wilderness
Worth
Lose
Loses

More quotes by Aldo Leopold

Image
Your woodlot is, in fact, an historical document which faithfully records your personal philosophy.
Aldo Leopold
Image
It must be poor life that achieves freedom from fear.
Aldo Leopold
Image
Ideas, like men, can become dictators. We Americans have so far escaped regimentation by our rulers, but have we escaped regimentation by our own ideas? I doubt if there exists today a more complete regimentation of the human mind than that accomplished by our self-imposed doctrine of ruthless utilitarianism.
Aldo Leopold
Image
Hydrologists have demonstrated that the meanderings of a creek are a necessary part of the hydrologic functioning. The flood plain belongs to the river. The ecologist sees clearly that for similar reasons we can get along with less channel improvement on Round River.
Aldo Leopold
Image
Only the most uncritical minds are free from doubt.
Aldo Leopold
Image
Bread and beauty grow best together. Their harmonious integration can make farming not only a business but an art the land not only a food-factory but an instrument for self-expression, on which each can play music to his own choosing.
Aldo Leopold
Image
When some remote ancestor of ours invented the shovel, he became a giver: He could plant a tree. And when the axe was invented, he became a taker: He could chop it down. Whoever owns land has thus assumed, whether he knows it or not, the divine functions of creating and destroying plants.
Aldo Leopold
Image
Every farm woodland, in addition to yielding lumber, fuel and posts, should provide its owner a liberal education. This crop of wisdom never fails, but it is not always harvested.
Aldo Leopold
Image
I love all trees, but I am in love with pines.
Aldo Leopold
Image
No farmer-sportsman group is stronger than the ties of mutual confidence and enthusiasm which bind its members.
Aldo Leopold
Image
That dark laboratory we call the soil.
Aldo Leopold
Image
Wilderness, then, assumes unexpected importance as a laboratory for the study of land - health.
Aldo Leopold
Image
Having to squeeze the last drop of utility out of the land has the same desperate finality as having to chop up the furniture to keep warm.
Aldo Leopold
Image
Ethical behavior is doing the right thing when no one else is watching- even when doing the wrong thing is legal.
Aldo Leopold
Image
I confess my own leisure to be spent entirely in search of adventure, without regard to prudence, profit, self improvement, learning, or any other serious thing.
Aldo Leopold
Image
Six days shalt thou paddle and pack, but on the seventh thou shall wash thy socks.
Aldo Leopold
Image
There is, as yet, no sense of pride in the husbandry of wild plants and animals, no sense of shame in the proprietorship of a sick landscape. We tilt windmills in behalf of conservation in convention halls and editorial offices, but on the back forty we disclaim even owning a lance.
Aldo Leopold
Image
The worthiness of any cause is not measured by its clean record, but by its readiness to see the blots when they are pointed out, and to change its mind.
Aldo Leopold
Image
The oldest task in human history: to live on a piece of land without spoiling it.
Aldo Leopold
Image
Relegating grizzlies to Alaska is about like relegating happiness heaven one may never get there.
Aldo Leopold