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Moderator: Good morning listeners, and welcome to
this installation of “Debates with the Dearly Departed.” Today’s topic: Conservations vs.
Preservation (with a focus on timber management).
Muir: Do you think we could refer to it as “management of
forested trees” instead of automatically referring to trees as a commodity?
Pinchot: Seriously John? We are getting this nitpicky already?
Moderator: Of course Mr. Muir. Scratch that
listeners, you heard the man.
Anyways, shaken down to the most in-a-nut-shell summary, the definitional
difference between conservation and preservation of forested trees, is the
difference between using them sparingly to sustain into the future and keeping
forested areas in an unaltered condition.
But, there is a
greater nuance to the differences.
So, to help illustrate the details of the difference, we have today in
the studio two men who are by legacy (if not by name) the Founding Father’s of
each school of thought in natural resource management: Gifford Pinchot and JohnMuir.
Welcome to the
show gentlemen. To start things
off, let’s hear about your definitions of your schools of thought. Mr. Pinchot, we will always start with
you on each topic, including this one.
Pinchot: Conservation
means the wise use of natural resources for the lasting good of mankind. The Forest Service mantra when it comes
to the management of trees and all natural resources is that we should be
intent on achieving “the greatest good for the greatest number in the long
run.” This is the foundation of
conservation.
Muir: Preservation
means the protection of nature in order to keep it in its natural
condition. This is not only
important for the health of the American landscapes, forests most especially,
but it essential to the health of the Spirit of Man. Because each of us “needs beauty as well as bread, places to
plan in and pray in, where nature may heal and give strength to body and
soul.” However, the issue is that,
while “God has cared for these trees, saved them from drought, disease,
avalanches and a thousands tempests and floods…He cannot save them from
fools.” And we, as the race of
mankind, or too often fools in how we use and peruse our natural resources,
which is why developing a preservation mentality is key for the, as Mr. Gifford
said, achievement of the “greatest good for the greatest number in the long
run.”
Gifford: Low blow John…
Moderator: Let’s keep the heat down gentlemen;
we’re only just beginning our discussion.
But now that we have the basic definitions, let’s talk about each school
of thought in the context of a few sub topics.
First: the Multiple Use & Sustained Yield Actof 1960. This Act, as you
both know, mandates that national forests be “administered for outdoor
recreation, range, timber, watershed, and wildlife and fish purposes.” Does this policy collaborate or
clash with your conservation and preservation?
Pinchot: For the most
part this act is in step with the mentality of conservation. By managing forests to meet the needs
of all the uses listed in the Act, trees are made available for many uses for
the good of the greatest number of people in the long run. I’d also like to mention the ecosystem management approach,
which exists in close collaboration with the purpose of this act. What I mean here is that when timber
management plans are made, they must take into consideration how human
interaction with forested trees will affect not only the trees but also the
ecosystem over all and consider each separate
part of the ecosystem individually.
Muir: This is one point that Gifford and I mostly agree
upon. This act and taking an
ecological management approach is in support of the mentality of preservation
as well, although sometimes there is a danger of using either to justify the
over exploitation of trees. For
example, I do believe that forests should be managed to allow for recreational
use, because everyone needs to “break clear away, once in a while, and climb a
mountain or spend a week in the woods” to “wash your spirit clean.” However, there is a danger of over-emphasizing one of the
multiple uses (such as trail building and trail use for recreation) over
another (like watershed maintenance).
All that is to say, we just have to ensure that all uses are kept in
equal balance and that will ensure the preservation of our forest trees.
Moderator: Always good to start on a point of
commonality. Next, let’s talk
about the Wilderness Act of 1964
and how that fits within both conservation and preservation. As a reminder to our listeners, the
Wilderness Act established protected areas of nature to be left unchanged and
undeveloped. These “wilderness
areas” are within federal land boundaries, which means that both the National
Park Service (championed by Mr. Muir) and the Forest Service (championed by
Mr.Pinchot) are among the organizations that manages these areas.
Pinchot: To be honest, while the Wilderness
Act doesn’t directly go against conservation, it does hinder and often lose
sight of the foundational principle of conservation: achieving the greatest
good for the greatest number in the long run. Using timber specifically as an example to illustrate what I
mean here is that the act’s narrow-sighted focus on keeping land in a
“primitive” condition often creates an obstacle in managing timber resources
for the common good. Wilderness
areas border right up next to national forests, which are harvested for timber
products. This makes harvest plans
more complicated at times, in order to avoid making any changes to the forests
“next door”, if you will, and this includes prohibiting the building of roads,
which is what enables harvest to be practical and possible. On top of that, if wilderness areas are
not permitted to be thinned and if that also entails suppressing wildfires, in
order to keep the land looking “natural” for the general public, then the
chance of massive wildfires is increased. These massive wildfires do very little to promote the
“greatest good.” In short – the
Wilderness Act does help conservation but it also hinders it.
Muir: The
Wilderness Act was a great piece of legislation for preservation, and I am a
devout supporter. This act ensures
that there are portions of land, including forested land, that are set apart as
natural and untouched by man. This
not only allows visitors to access to areas of land to experience true wilderness, to get the pioneer
experience of wild land that is
central experience to American identity, but it also preserves the land as a
sort of time capsule that exhibits what the United States originally was before
we “civilized” it. Having
wilderness areas allows us to keep record of what the land should be restored
to if we should find, in future decades, that the ways in which we have changed
surrounding areas of land was not for the “greatest good,” as Gifford puts it.
Moderator: What do you
both think of the management plans of
the Sequoia and Sierra National Forests? Do they jive with preservation and conservation in your
opinion?
Pinchot: Both plans I
believe are well developed to promote the conservation of forest and timber
resources for the “long run.” If
memory serves me right, the Sierra National Forest management plan states that
it aims to “provide a management program reflecting a mix of activities, (and)
allow use and protection of forest resources.” It also incorporates the plans of various wilderness areas
within the national forest. All
that is to say, the management plan is in line with both the Multiple Use and
Sustained Yield Act and the ecological management approach, which are both cooperative
with conservation.
Muir: I mostly
approve of the management plans and see them as collaborative with the ideals
of preservation of those forests. Especially
because these management plans take into consideration the full ecological
management perspective, which will better ensure the preservation of all forest
resources, as far as is possible. I
think my main issue with the management plans is that they each incorporate
timber harvest plans within them, which, definitionally, are not all that
supportive of preserving the forest in its natural state. Because, in order to harvest trees, changes
the forest by cutting down trees and by the building of roads, etc. to move the
trees to the mill. However, I do
especially think that the Sequoia National Forest’s implementation of the “National
Forest System Planning Rule,” which mandates that any forest plan revision must
be both grounded in science and be open to public input, is in support of
preservation tactics.
Moderator: That is a perfect segue to my final
discussion topic, what is the role of
public opinion, emotions, and science in the implementation of
conservation or preservation methods in forest management?
Pinchot: As far as conservation goes, I believe that both public
opinion and science have important roles in the creation of forest management
plans, but that constructing such plans based on emotional considerations
should be limited. I think that
hearing the public opinion will allow natural resource managers to have a
better sense of what the “greatest number” of people see as the “greatest good.”
Then, finding the science to legitimize the public demands for the use and
protection of these natural resources (especially trees) creates the foundation
for wise conservation plans. The problem with making management plans based on
emotions is they are often misguided and only benefit a small amount of people
in the long run. The emotional objection
to cutting down trees, for example, is blind to the need to use wood products
in our everyday life, to meet basic demands to benefit the human population at
large. Such people who object to
timber harvest often do not realize just how much they use wood products in
their everyday lives. Of course
limitations must be placed on harvesting trees for human demands, and measures
taken to ensure that forests are sustained into the future, but that is the
perfect balance the conservation mentality creates.
Muir: I think all
three in perfect balance is what is needed for the preservation of forested
trees. Public opinion is essential,
both to show politicians the emotional importance natural resources has to the
public they serve, which will help guide them in making forest management
plans, but also as a means to balance out the often cold and limited
perspective of bare-bones science.
Science, however, is important because as Gifford mentioned already,
management plans based too purely on emotion are dangerous, and I will add that
they are dangerous to the preservation
of trees. For example, if emotion
without science were used to make management plans, public desire to have fresh
firewood for a family camping experience and in a family home would result in
the harvesting of trees without limits, and could lead to completely
deforesting certain areas. On the
other side of things, if science alone were used, say from the engineering
perspective, then forested trees might be cut down without thorough thought to
make room for a reservoir under the justification that scientific projections
predict that the amount of water made available to the local population justifies
the cutting down of so many trees.
The emotional input here, will balance out decisions made solely on
science, which might otherwise rape the land of its wildness, and find an alternative solution instead. Going into the crafting of forest
management plans with a preservationist perspective will put an equal emphasis
on including all three elements, and will lead to the wisest management plan in
the end.
Moderator: Well gentlemen, that is all the time we
have today. Thank you for rolling
over in your graves to make an appearance on the show today. Tune in next week listeners when we
speak with Henry David Thoreau and Theodore Roosevelet on what makes for a true
“Wilderness Man.”
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