My two favourite things in life are libraries and bicycles. They both move people forward without wasting anything. The perfect day: riding a bike to the library.

Can there be any question that the human is the least harmonious beast in the forest and the creature most toxic to the nest?

Management” of anything as complicated as a woods requires more humility than comes easily to our species, at least in its American incarnation.

Nothing is more important to human beings than an ecologically functioning, life sustaining biosphere on the earth. It is the only habitable place we know of in a forbidding universe. We all depend on it...

Connor couldn’t be sure, but he thought he heard him mumble, “First Dean, then McCall. These boys are dropping like flies.

For a century, environmentalism has divided itself into warring camps: conservationists versus preservationists…. The struggle pits those who would meddle with nature against those who would leave it be…. The only sensible way forward lies...

Earth provides enough to satisfy every man’s needs, but not every man’s greed.

With a gentle touch, she brushed the hair off his forehead. “I was sort of hoping you’d be a little more relaxed today.”He took her hand and kissed it.”I’m very relaxed.””Finally?” She raised her eyebrows...

And Man created the plastic bag and the tin and aluminum can and the cellophane wrapper and the paper plate, and this was good because Man could then take his automobile and buy all his...

I’d drive a thousand miles just to learn how to conserve gas and help save the environment. But that’s just who I am. I’m a thoughtful guy.

Global transformation can occur only when each individual has the courage to awaken from this amnesia to our true self and then make conscious choices true to our spirit. The human race is the only...

At dusk in the Corcovado National Park in Costa Rica, Melissa Overton barely heard the constant sound of crickets chirping all around them. Prowling through the dense, tropical rainforest as a jaguar, she listened for...

We depend on this planet to eat, drink, breathe, and live. Figuring out how to keep our life support system running needs to be our number-one priority. Nothing is more important than finding a way...

In conservation, the motto should always be ‘never say die’.

He parked the car, pressed the button for the roof to fold back, and undid his seat belt. “It’s an emergency.”Goldilocks giggled. She unfastened her belt and hopped onto her knees. “Yes, I can see”...

What we are doing to the forests of the world is but a mirror reflection of what we are doing to ourselves and to one another.

To speak of sparing anything because it is beautiful is to waste one’s breath and incur ridicule in the bargain. The aesthetic sense- the power to enjoy through the eye, and the ear, and the...

Is it wrong of me to propose a ceasefire agreement between humans and whales and dolphins, I know it is in actuality a one sided massacre, but so was Bosnia and there the ceasefire is...

To those devoid of imagination a blank place on the map is a useless waste; to others, the most valuable part.

Wildness is the preservation of the World.

They ravaged neither the rivers nor the forest, and if they irrigated, they took as little water as would serve their needs. The land and all that it bore they treated with consideration; not attempting...

He chuckled. ‘Come here.”She hesitated.’ We don’t have to do anything. Just … sleep.’ She let out her breath on a heavy sign. ‘You don’t want to just sleep.’ Then she moved in next to...

Spraying to kill trees and and raspberry bushes after a clear-cut merely looks unaesthetic for a short time, but tree plantations are deliberate ecodeath. Yet, tree planting is often pictorially advertised on television and in...

In what terms should we think of these beings, nonhuman yet possessing so very many human-like characteristics? How should we treat them? Surely we should treat them with the same consideration and kindness as we...

Feel free to check out the hotel and talk to the staff,” he said slipping out of bed. “And I’m happy to give you an up-close look at what we’re doing.” When she didn’t answer,...

Water and air, the two essential fluids on which all life depends, have become global garbage cans.

If 22 bushels (1,300 pounds) of rice and 22 bushels of winter grain are harvested from a quarter acre field, then the field will support five to ten people each investing an average of less...

For me, nature is something you watch on the Discovery Channel, or on the evening news — as you learn how much more of it’s been savaged to make way for the Blackberry realm that...

Ability to see the cultural value of wilderness boils down, in the last analysis, to a question of intellectual humility. The shallow-minded modern who has lost his rootage in the land assumes that he has...

When I consider that the nobler animal have been exterminated here – the cougar, the panther, lynx, wolverine, wolf, bear, moose, dear, the beaver, the turkey and so forth and so forth, I cannot but...

One cannot be pessimistic about the West. This is the native home of hope. When it fully learns that cooperation, not rugged individualism, is the quality that most characterizes and preserves it, then it will...

But if you wake up and are feeling….needy…

Maybe we’ll live to see sharks recover. Right now, that seems as improbable as seeing all these falcons. Hope is the ability to see how things could be better. The world of human affairs has...

Man was the last of Creation but was given the duty to care for the Earth and all other created living creatures.

Charlie brought her dandelion to her mouth. “I’ve heard that, too. But this happens to be something I’ve done a lot and it’s easy. Just take a deep breath, put your lips together, and blow.”...

Oh Beautiful for smoggy skies, insecticided grain,For strip-mined mountain’s majesty above the asphalt plain.America, America, man sheds his waste on thee,And hides the pines with billboard signs, from sea to oily sea.

In every remote corner of the world there are people like Carl Jones and Don Merton who have devoted their lives to saving threatened species. Very often, their determination is all that stands between an...

If the day comes when our descendants can venture with wonder into chestnut forests, we will have gained back more than a perfect tree. We will have gained a new reason for hope.

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.

Do you know how many acres of beautiful forests and moors have been destroyed by your company? How many animals have lost their homes and how many trees have been murdered? I am sick of...

People ask: Why should I care about the ocean? Because the ocean is the cornerstone of earth’s life support system, it shapes climate and weather. It holds most of life on earth. 97% of earth’s...

To those who serve to protect the exotic animals in the rainforest. Thanks for making it possible for so many of them to remain in their natural habitat and for stopping those who are destroying...

rights of the unborn” as though a human life begins at conception but we don’t need to concern ourselves with its prospects after birth. Raging over the divine sanctity of anyone else’s pregnancy is a...

Put on a sweater.

You are so going down for that.” He grabbed the keys and headed back to the road. “When you least expect it,” he added over his shoulder.”I’m shaking in my shoes,” she called out.”You’re not...

I guess even the prettiest things eventually end up stinking. Everything does. We all will die and rot and decay and be reborn as dirt or flowers or worms, or polar bears who will drown...

The question is whether any civilization can wage relentless war on life without destroying itself, and without losing the right to be called civilized.

This is how social change ultimately happens: enlightened values do not change behavior; the contours of self-interest are altered and new values rush into the vacuum.

That land is a community is the basic concept of ecology, but that land is to be loved and respected is an extension of ethics. That lands yields a cultural harvest is a fact long...

Nature is not a place to visit. It is home.