The Wilderness Idea

I've found myself thinking a lot lately about the idea of wilderness in America. Quick synopsis to get the thoughts flowing....around the end of the 19th century the US Census Bureau declared to frontier closed and in 1964 Congress passed The Wilderness Act, making it possible for them to declare an area official wilderness. This means that it is unimpeded by man and that man is merely a visitor who is not to stay.

Pennsylvania has two designated wilderness areas and one of these is near Hearts Content in the Allegheny National Forest. I'll be going up there next week for some primitive camping and it got me thinking over why exactly we find wilderness important in our society.

So many places, even in our most remote states, have these huge urban centers that take away from the beauty of the natural wilds. When looking at a town like Bozeman, MT or Jackson, WY...they're surrounded by these beautiful mountains and scenery, but yet they are yet another urban hustle & bustle center in the middle of what was once the Rocky Mountains of the American West (pictured below is the Bob Marshall Wilderness in Montana). 

The Appalachian Mountains along the eastern seaboard has been inundated with cities and towns.

Where do we draw the line? Do you not find it important

 to still have a part of our country that is truly wild? Nature should be able to take its own toll on the land. Man should be merely a visitor and should be subject to the laws of the land as so. My professor states that in a wilderness area, there should be no rescue should you decide to go camping and get in trouble. I feel this is right. You go backpacking and run the risk of knowing t

hat you are completely at the will of how well you can survive.

It is amazing to think of a place that does not have roads, air strips, cabins, or dams on the rivers. There is not a lot of these places left and I think that we need to be able to have beautiful places such as this where we can get away from the busyness of everyday American life and get back to our roots. Enjoy nature...enjoy the land around us...and enjoy knowing that the place you are in is truly wild.

Thoughts from a kayak...

It's spring time here in Western Pennsylvania and today's 70 degree weather found me out on Lake Arthur (Moraine State Park) out in my kayak. As I slipped silently along the banks of the lake looking at the waterfowl, beavers, and turtles, I found myself deep in thought about a lot of the issues that are facing us dealing with overuse of our park lands.

It's been a subject that I've touched on heavily in research during my undergraduate studies. Ecotourism is a huge industry and one that is continuing to grow. For those that don't know what ecotourism is, Princeton University defines it as "tourism to exotic or threatened ecosystems to observe wildlife or to help preserve nature." While today was not a busy day at Moraine State Park because it is still pretty early, I thought back to the time I've spent in Montana, Wyoming and Idaho. I've travelled across the country and have visited many national and state lands.

I feel like we are loving our public lands to death. When we look at a park like Smoky Mountains in Tennessee, we see what used to once be one of the most beautiful landscapes in the nation drowned out by the automobile exhaust from the massive amounts of vehicles from the tourists, the serene sounds of nature are drowning out the whisper of the winds, the calls of the birds, and the sounds of the streams being overloaded with water running off the hills from the harsh winter, welcoming the warmth of the summer.

To be in Grand Canyon National Park and have the drone of planes and helicopters chartering the tourists in and out of this massive rock gorge is a horrendous waste of this beautiful landscape. 

Yellowstone National Park handles over 6 million tourists a year among the 5 or 6 main roads that cut through the park in search of a wild bison, a herd of Rocky Mountain Elk, or the elusive Gray Wolf, recently reintroduced to the area after nearly 60 years of extermination.

Is this the type of scene that we want out children to grow up seeing; the RV's bustling in and out of the gates of our parks, the Beverly Hills styled "outdoors man" with his fancy GPS systems and water filtration systems sitting around their 8-walled tents and considering themselves "roughing it?" I find myself appalled at the number of people who have no appreciation for nature around us and feel that it is their job to control nature. What happened to the idea of escaping from the hustle and bustle of today's urban life and once again retracing the routes of our forefathers?

We've lost sight of what it really means to explore the lands around us and instead maintain the same routes and paths that every other tourist decides to take. It is great that people decide to stop going to the amusement parks and other urban enticements in order to spend time in nature, but I really think these excursions are hurting the land around us.

There is a reason that people have started pushing ideas such as low-impact camping and other forms of recreation. We need to rethink the ways that we view and explore nature. We need to sustainably visit these places, to conserve them for the future, and to take time to think about how we can make sure our children and their children have the same opportunities that we have had.

I know these thoughts tonight may seem jumbled or confused...but there are just so many thoughts I have on this subject and it has been hard to organize them.

The beginning...

I guess that my interest in the environment really began around 5th grade. My elementary school took a 4 day trip to a local Environmental Learning Center. As a 5th grade boy, this was the first time that I had really had the opportunity to learn about earth cycles, wildlife, and conservation of our natural resources. It was something that greatly interested me and I immediately developed a huge interest into what I could do to help out.

This, though, was not when my interest in the outdoors began. As a little kid, we had video games. We rarely played them, though. Our parents always made us "go outside and play". It was through these excursions that I learned the value of exploration. I was always catching frogs and snakes, rescuing baby birds and bunnies, building forts, climbing trees, and picking wild blackberries and strawberries. I, at a young age, developed a deep appreciation for spending time outside and as I got older, I neglected playing these video games and continued my exploration of the natural world around me.

As I grew older, I began to develop an interest in finding out more about what made these natural ecosystems work. My family was always taking vacations and through these trips, I had the opportunity to explore South Dakota, Wyoming, Montana, Florida...all over. I've been in 38 different states at this point in my life. Due to these experiences, I accepted positions for the past 2 summers working in the Yellowstone National Park region where I continued to learn and grow in my passion for the outdoors, wildlife, natural resources, and environmental education.

I spent the past 4 years studying Parks and Resource Management at Slippery Rock University of Pennsylvania. Graduation is upon me in 2 weeks and I will be continuing my studies at Slippery Rock, where I will be getting my Masters of Science degree in Sustainable Systems.

This blog is an opportunity for me to share my thoughts about the things that are going on in the world around us. Environmental and resource issues are in the news daily. From the oil crisis to water issues, these are prevalent topics in our lives that we need to be aware of. Some would call me an environmental extremist, other a "hippy", but I merely find myself to be a young man with a passion for the world around me, a passion to educate those around me about the issues facing us everyday, and a love for this world that we have been given.

My mission is simple. It is almost identical to that of the National Park Service:

"...to promote and regulate the use of the...national parks...which purpose is to conserve the scenery and the natural and historic objects and the wild life therein and to provide for the enjoyment of the same in such manner and by such means as will leave them unimpaired for the enjoyment of future generations."

Without education and insight into the world around us, these resources will not be there for the future. You do not have to agree with what I say, nor do I expect you to, but these are my thoughts and I hope you can at least respect that.