A Sand County Almanac

"Aldo Leopold is known as the father of ‘rewilding’, although it wasn’t called that at the time. He was the first to acknowledge natural processes at landscape scale and, memorably, the first to understand the role of the apex predator. “The cowman who clears his range of wolves,” he wrote, “has not learned to think like a mountain. Hence we have dustbowls and rivers washing the future into the sea.” This was almost a century before wolves were reintroduced to Yellowstone National Park in the US, kickstarting processes that have ultimately proved to affect the course of rivers and — counterintuitively — increase biodiversity; a phenomenon now known as ‘apex predator trophic cascades’. He also expressed the sadness and frustration that inevitably befalls one who ventures down the path of conservation: “One of the penalties of an ecological education is that one lives alone in a world of wounds.” To me, that rings painfully true. As an ecologist he was remarkably open-minded and un-egotistical. He genuinely felt that nature is the greatest teacher of all – and that’s a lesson, I feel, that we all do well to follow. The notion that we must work every inch of our land for food production has been ingrained in us since World War Two. But the unpublicized reality is that, thanks to the miracles of modern technology, the world is already producing enough to feed ten billion people – well over two billion more than are currently alive. The shocking corollary is that we waste a third of this food: 1.3 billion tonnes every year. So we are not teetering on the brink of starvation, as the food and farming industry would have us believe. However, modern intensive farming is creating real problems for the environment and we can’t go on along this trajectory forever. In 2014, the National Farmers’ Union announced we had only 100 harvests left in the UK before there’s no topsoil left in which to plant a crop. That’s because our soil structure is so degraded by repetitive ploughing that it simply blows away as dust in the wind or gets washed out to sea. So there’s a desperate need for soil restoration – and rewilding can provide that, cheaply and, it seems, remarkably quickly. It also mitigates against flooding, replenishes water resources, and purifies that water. And it creates habitat for pollinating insects. All essential things that will safeguard the future of farming. “Rather than being cast as the enemy of farming, rewilding should be seen as its greatest ally” A former advisor to Natural England came up with a really interesting idea after visiting us: pop-up Knepps. An area of degraded land could be rewilded for, say, 20, 30, 40 or 50 years – enough time to regenerate the soil and provide a period of emerging scrub habitat for birds and wildlife – and then be returned to agricultural production. The land to be rewilded would be strategically planned over a much larger area, creating stepping stones or corridors for nature. As one piece of land is taken out of rewilding and returned to sustainable agriculture, another in the vicinity embarks on rewilding; ensuring the same amount of land remains under rewilding to balance the amount of land under agriculture. Much like the rotational farming systems of old, only more extensive and on a much longer time-scale. So, rather than being cast as the enemy of farming, rewilding should, I think, be seen as its greatest ally. The two can, and should, work together."

"It’s not easy to put my finger on exactly why I chose A Sand County Almanac . I contemplated it by the fire last night and found myself going through a similar process to Leopold in the essay “Axe-in-Hand”, where he attempts to understand why, whenever he has to fell a tree “for the good of the land”, he always chooses any tree but the pine. He examines all his biases—the fact that he planted the pine himself; that it will shelter more wildlife; because it is rare where he lives; it will live longer; that it could ultimately earn him more money; and so on—but none of these reasons survive his open and honest scrutiny. After a couple of pages of this he admits he’s none the wiser and says, “The only conclusion I have ever reached is that I love all trees, but I am in love with pines.” “I love many books, but I am in love with A Sand County Almanac ” So why does this book take pride of place on my book shelf over, let’s say, Walden ? Is it because it’s more relevant than ever, 70 years after its publication? That can’t be it, as Walden is a century older again, and equally as relevant. Perhaps it’s because Leopold is widely considered to be the father of conservation—or the grandfather of a grandchild he never met, “rewilding”—and has my admiration for the work he did in protecting wilderness. I can’t say it is, as I’m not thinking about any of that when I re-read and re-read and re-read this book. Is it because he’s a better naturalist than Thoreau? Well, he is, and every other nature writer too, but unlike the rest he feels no need to endlessly drop the names of obscure plants to puff up his feathers in that regard. I couldn’t bear it if he did. I take the axe out of his hand, and see him with his pencil for a moment. Is it simply because he’s a brilliant writer? Maybe, but then again, so was Thoreau. Am I affected by his sincere humility and the calm, understated authority in his writing? Is it because it contains, in my view, the greatest essay ever written, “Thinking Like a Mountain”? Or was it his capacity to draw analogies from nature in a way that has taught me more about my place in the world than any other book? These are all quite plausible explanations, but still I’m not convinced. The only conclusion I reached last night was that I love many books, but I am in love with A Sand County Almanac ."