Summary Of A Sand County Almanac By Aldo Leopold

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A Sand County Almanac by Aldo Leopold is a detailed primary source that offers the reader an extensive viewpoint on the relationship between humans and nature. Aldo Leopold’s desire in his thesis is to present his infamous theory on Land Ethics, which states the preservationist viewpoint about the obligation humans have of protecting the land in which they inhabit. Specifically, Leopold makes an observation about the harm of recreational activities and the impact of human nature that he wants his readers to note. Even though the relationship between humans and nature has been conjoining, society continues to do more harm than it does good. While nature works with humans in order to survive, humans attempt to dominate what they can control and …show more content…

The first and second part, taking a natural history approach to the subject of relationships between humans and nature, discuss his experiences on the family farm in Wisconsin and other various portions of the world. Furthermore, the detailed accounts of various flora and fauna species, how harmful farming has been to the soil and the destruction of nature from recreational activities, introduce Leopold’s argument that humans, even unconsciously, have been harming nature for a multitude of years. The third part, applying a philosophical approach, takes these events into account and analyzes the various destructions that humans have caused. In the chapter “Thinking Like A Mountain,” Aldo Leopold recounts the hunting trip that he took part in when he was younger. As he watched the light fade from the Wolf’s eyes, his group of friends believed that they had helped the deer population’s chance of survival. Instead, by destroying the top predator of the mountain, the deer population grew out of control and harmed the mountain’s ecological environment. From this example, Leopold uses the situation of the she wolf to explain to his audience that man’s influence in nature, no matter how beneficial it is to one species’ survival, always has consequences to

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