[Sportsman]

"A man may not care for golf and still be human, but the man who does
not like to see, hunt, photograph, or otherwise outwit birds or
animals is hardly normal. He is supercivilized, and I for one do not
know how to deal with him. Babes do not tremble when they are shown a
golf ball, but I should not like to own the boy whose hair does not
lift his hat when he sees his first deer. We are dealing, therefore,
with something that lies very deep." [p.227]

"...there are cultural values in the sports, customs, and experiences
that renew contacts with wild things. I venture the opinion that these
values are of three kinds.

First there is value in any experience that reminds us of our
distinctive national origins and evolution..." [p.211]

"Second, there is value in any experience that reminds us of our
dependency on the soil-plant-animal-man food chain, and of the
fundamental organization of the biota." [p.212]

"Third, there is value in any experience that exercises those ethical
restraints collectively called 'sportsmanship'."

"A peculiar virtue in wildlife ethics is that the hunter obviously has
no gallery to applaud or disapprove of this conduct. Whatever his
acts, they are dictated by his own conscious, rather than a mob of
onlookers. It is difficult to exaggerate the importance of this fact.

Voluntary adherence to an ethical code elevates the self-respect of
the sportsman, but it should not be forgotten that voluntary disregard
of the code degenerates and depraves him. For example, a common
denominator of all sporting codes is not to waste good meat." [p.213]

"We seek contacts with nature because we derive pleasure from
them... The duck-hunter in his blind and the operatic singer on the
stage, despite the disparity of their accoutrements, are doing the same
thing. Each is reviving, in play, a drama formerly inherent in daily
life. Both are, in the last analysis, esthetic exercies." [p.283]

"Scientists have an epigram: ontogeny repeats phylogeny. What they
mean is that the development of each individual repeats the
evolutionary history of the race. This is true of mental as well as
physical things. The trophy-hunter is the caveman
reborn. Trophy-hunting is the prerogative of youth, racial or
individual, and nothing to apologize for." [p.293-294]

----------------
Aldo Leopold. 1949. "A Sand County Almanac". Oxford University Press,
New York. ISBN 0-345-34505-3


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Daryl Planter 91C2
Targa