How like fish we are: ready, nay eager, to seize upon whatever new thing some wind of circumstance shakes down upon the river of time! And how we rue our haste, finding the gilded morsel to contain a hook!

A conservationist is one who is humbly aware that with each stroke [of the axe] he is writing his signature on the face of his land.

We stand guard over works of art, but species representing the work of aeons are stolen from under our noses

There are some who can live without wild things, and some who cannot. For us of the minority, the opportunity to see geese is more important than television, and the chance to find a pasque-flower is a right as inalienable as free speech.

Our tools are better than we are, and grow better faster than we do. They suffice to crack the atom, to command the tides, but they do not suffice for the oldest task in human history, to live on a piece of land without spoiling it.

There are some who can live without wild things and some who cannot.

Keeping records enhances the pleasure of the search and the chance of finding order and meaning in these events.