Reconnection to the natural world is fundamental to human health, well-being, spirit, and survival.

In every bio-region, one of the most urgent tasks is to rebuild the community of naturalists - so radically depleted in recent years, as young people have spent less time in nature, and higher education has placed less value on such disciplines as zoology……The times are right for the return of the amateur, twenty-first-century, citizen naturalist. To be a citizen naturalist is to take personal action, to both protect and participate in nature.

The times I spent with my children in nature are among my most meaningful memories-and I hope theirs.

We are telling our kids that nature is in the past and it probably doesn't count anymore, the future is in electronics, the boogeyman is in the woods, and playing outdoors is probably illicit and possibly illegal.

Time in nature is not leisure time; it's an essential investment in our chidlren's health (and also, by the way, in our own).

These days, unplugged places are getting hard to find.

Nature is beautiful, but not always pretty.