# Survival > General Survival Discussion >  there's very little wilderness left in the lower  48 states

## taint

almost everywhere, there's fences, culverts, roads, electrical or phone wire, buildings, vehicles, etc.  If you are ever 'out there in it " for real, you'll find it much more efficient to walk half a day to "modern" shelter than to make one bushcraft style. :-) Cause there will be all sorts of stuff in that shelter (or vehicle) that you can put to great use. Containers, pipe, insulation, wire. When it's truly life or death, the wilderness is not where you want to be. Especially not swamp or desert areas during summer,  or cold country in wintertime. Those areas just make it REALLY hard on you and you dont have to stay there!  The indians WERE restrained to their tribal areas, cause there would be such high risk from enemies and they had so little in the way of fighting gear and they knew so little about other area's fauna and flora. Their gear was very heavy and bulky, so they had to use horses to lug it around, and horses make it much harder to be stealthy.

----------


## natertot

That is assuming you know where the modern shelter is and it is actually within walking distance prior to sundown. Under ideal circumstances, a healthy person can only cover about 20mi a day. If a shelter is farther than 10 mi, don't know where it is, there is illness/injury, or any combination thereof then the chances of reaching it are slim. Cover as much as you can one day, set up temp shelter and then continue on the next.

----------


## 1stimestar

Yep, next bridge is 500 miles...

Guests can not see images in the messages. Please register in the forum.

----------


## finallyME

I don't think you have been out west.

----------


## Rick

I guess that depends on your definition of lot or little.

----------


## hunter63

Wilderness is where you find it....and what your definition is, I guess. 

Used to hunt on an 80 acre woods....was connected to the north west corner of the Bermuda Triangle....walk around for hours,... lost.
Then a 4:30 closing time, you could see the trucks go by, everyone going home....so you knew where the road was....
Scary

Or

Family lost in Halloween corn maze:

http://loweringthebar.net/2011/10/fa...calls-911.html

----------


## Wildthang

But........But.......But......what about .22's and .223's?

----------


## hunter63

.....and sat phones....

----------


## kyratshooter

Hey, I can type "wilderness" into my GPS and it pops up a half dozen places in four states, all east of the Mississippi river!

Also shows me how to get there and get back without incident or having to eat bugs, roots and berries.

----------


## natertot

> Hey, I can type "wilderness" into my GPS and it pops up a half dozen places in four states, all east of the Mississippi river!
> 
> Also shows me how to get there and get back without incident or having to eat bugs, roots and berries.


Where's the fun in that!!!!!

----------


## primitiveskills

Wilderness is everywhere. Our temporary overlay of pavement and structures is mere static to the prevailing winds, flow of water, and forces of nature. In fact, many sub-rural and even urban areas have increased edge and support lots of wild life. While I don't recommend eating too many, "rock doves" or city pigeons have a lot of breast meat for their size and are east to take out with a stick. Deer move between houses in sub-rural housing to eat rose hips and ornamental shrubs. In a pinch a locking snare would bring in all kinds of venison. While roads don't make sense in relationship to the landscape, a quick look at google earth will have you mapping out the nearest and most likely sources for fresh water, seasonal deer patterns, and favorite berry harvesting areas. Making these connections, and adding to that the time and sequence of harvesting events (like cattail pollen, snapping turtle egg gathering, road kill raccoon season-for the useful fat), can be added to your google calendar through out the years. Add to that dumpster diving, emergency entry skills, and guerrilla gardening and, if you've spent time sharing the skills, a community of folks increasing bounty in the marginalized areas and you have a resilient network of folks tapping into and tending wilderness resources within the "matrix". I ain't running no more. My little thirty acre plot has bobcat, weasel coyote, deer, groundhog, and too many snow shoe hare to count. They may have mowed my Pine Barrens down in the 80's, but there will always be wilderness as long as there are hunters and outdoors folks who know how important it is to cultivate it and protect it.

----------


## pete lynch

> Hey, I can type "wilderness" into my GPS and it pops up a half dozen places in four states, all east of the Mississippi river!
> 
> Also shows me how to get there and get back without incident or having to eat bugs, roots and berries.


Careful, you could get lost for 50 days or more. Like that guy in the eastern mountains of Kentucky!

----------


## Seniorman

Taint, if you don't think there is much wilderness left, you might come out to Idaho and do some back packing in this location.  I've been back in some of this country and it is as wild as it gets.




If you enjoy being alone, hiking and camping in rugged country,  and making do on your own, this will be your huckleberry.    :Thumbup1: 

S.M.

----------


## Old GI

Might be shrinking, but plenty of wilderness in Colorado.

----------


## DoubleChinRooster

the word wilderness wont exist anymore if the government is allowed to microchip us.

----------


## Rick

Okay. I'm gonna back slowly away now. Ya'll have a great day. Take care.

----------


## hunter63

> Okay. I'm gonna back slowly away now. Ya'll have a great day. Take care.


I'm with you.....

----------


## crashdive123

> the word wilderness wont exist anymore if the government is allowed to microchip us.


Oh my goodness, give it a rest!  You either believe this forum is something it isn't, or you are trolling.  Either way KNOCK IT OFF!!!!!!

----------


## Mazer

> almost everywhere, there's fences, culverts, roads, electrical or phone wire, buildings, vehicles, etc.  If you are ever 'out there in it " for real, you'll find it much more efficient to walk half a day to "modern" shelter than to make one bushcraft style. :-) Cause there will be all sorts of stuff in that shelter (or vehicle) that you can put to great use. Containers, pipe, insulation, wire. When it's truly life or death, the wilderness is not where you want to be. Especially not swamp or desert areas during summer,  or cold country in wintertime. Those areas just make it REALLY hard on you and you dont have to stay there!  The indians WERE restrained to their tribal areas, cause there would be such high risk from enemies and they had so little in the way of fighting gear and they knew so little about other area's fauna and flora. Their gear was very heavy and bulky, so they had to use horses to lug it around, and horses make it much harder to be stealthy.


 You have made some serious over generalizations here. First walking to a "modern shelter" in times of civil unrest can shorten your life. You don't know who you are going to run into, their state of mind or their arsenal. The First People or Native Americans were highly adaptable people. Those who lived in the far Eastern US had a very different life from those living in the Mid West, which differed from those living in the South, which differed from those living in the Far West and that differed from the Southwest considerably. Not all Natives had to move, nor did all have "heavy or bulky gear" and many tries did not have horses, which were brought to the Americas by the Spaniards. So the Natives lived for centuries without horses. Although many tribes are nomadic, mainly those living in the Mid West (due to the migration patterns of the larger prey animals they hunted) however many tribes stayed put and did not venture too far from their places in the world unless to trade or marry.

----------


## Loneviking

> I don't think you have been out west.


I don't think he has either. The Sierras, the Rockies, Idaho, Montana, and Nevada has some of the most remote and lonesome wilderness going.

----------


## Lamewolf

> Hey, I can type "wilderness" into my GPS and it pops up a half dozen places in four states, all east of the Mississippi river!
> 
> Also shows me how to get there and get back without incident or having to eat bugs, roots and berries.


Yeah, 11000 acres 20 minutes from home in Southern Ohio !

----------


## Grizz123

> almost everywhere, there's fences, culverts, roads, electrical or phone wire, buildings, vehicles, etc.  If you are ever 'out there in it " for real, you'll find it much more efficient to walk half a day to "modern" shelter than to make one bushcraft style. :-) Cause there will be all sorts of stuff in that shelter (or vehicle) that you can put to great use. Containers, pipe, insulation, wire. When it's truly life or death, the wilderness is not where you want to be. Especially not swamp or desert areas during summer,  or cold country in wintertime. Those areas just make it REALLY hard on you and you dont have to stay there!  The indians WERE restrained to their tribal areas, cause there would be such high risk from enemies and they had so little in the way of fighting gear and they knew so little about other area's fauna and flora. Their gear was very heavy and bulky, so they had to use horses to lug it around, and horses make it much harder to be stealthy.


Native Americans have been living and thriving, not just surviving, in North America for 10's of thousands of years. Their "gear" was not heavy and bulky, to them it was what it was and if they needed something carry something they would. If they couldnt, they would make another when they got to their new destination. Most of the tribes were friendly to each other, trading and marrying with each other all the time. Where did you get your opinion of them?

----------


## Rick

He was banned so I don't thing he'll be answering you.

----------


## finallyME

So....we know that taint has been banned, right?

Read his other posts...if you feel like you have extra brain cells you want to kill off.

----------


## Grizz123

I didn't know he was banned

----------


## kyratshooter

Don't worry, he'll be back.

Different name, different IP address, but the same guy, over and over and over, telling us how we could really build a good forum here if we would just let him run it.

----------


## Wildthang

> almost everywhere, there's fences, culverts, roads, electrical or phone wire, buildings, vehicles, etc.  If you are ever 'out there in it " for real, you'll find it much more efficient to walk half a day to "modern" shelter than to make one bushcraft style. :-) Cause there will be all sorts of stuff in that shelter (or vehicle) that you can put to great use. Containers, pipe, insulation, wire. When it's truly life or death, the wilderness is not where you want to be. Especially not swamp or desert areas during summer,  or cold country in wintertime. Those areas just make it REALLY hard on you and you dont have to stay there!  The indians WERE restrained to their tribal areas, cause there would be such high risk from enemies and they had so little in the way of fighting gear and they knew so little about other area's fauna and flora. Their gear was very heavy and bulky, so they had to use horses to lug it around, and horses make it much harder to be stealthy.


The Indians were masters at using nature to their own advantage. They traveled very light and knew how to almost be invisible. Wow, a real Indian expert...........LOL

----------


## DOGMAN

It depends on Perspective and how you define Wilderness. Wilderness to humans is like beauty- it is relative and in the eye of the beholder.

From an urban human perspective- wilderness can be found anywhere.  You can get lost and have amazing wilderness experiences in lots of places.  In particular the less one knows about the outdoors the more places are available to them to find Wilderness adventure and solitude...

But, there is another perspective.  That is from the view of charismatic mega fauna- particularly large predators and the seasonal migratory ungulates they prey upon.  From that perspective there is really not much wilderness left in the contiguous USA.  Elk, bison, wolves and Grizzly bears simply do not have enough wild lands in the lower 48 states to allow the species to live and thrive in the wild without human management.  There is not enough public land to truly support these species .  The natural seasonal cycle for elk and bison is to migrate from higher elevations to the prairie-  due to private lands and concerns about diseases this is not allowed anymore.  These animals are essentially held captive on Federal lands.  Grizzlies and wolves also try to move to the low lands during certain parts of the year as well- this is not allowed- they are managed (killed) by the government when they encroach into human areas.  

So we can pretend there is wilderness in the lower 48, but that is really just a short sighted human mental construct.

----------


## Rick

I'm gonna have to get a sandwich, a drink and think on that a bit.

----------


## WalkingTree

The term 'wilderness' can certainly be used in different ways, and not necessarily be applied incorrectly. But I tend to think that 'wilderness' refers, not just to the existence of some plants or animals, and not just to a given person's familiarity with or knowledge of a place...but to an expanse of geography wherein non-human species and their ecosystems rule much more than humans, and there is very little or no climate control taking place.

----------


## kyratshooter

The term "wilderness" has a legal definition, and it does not eliminate the entire lower 48 states.  

http://www.wilderness.net/nwps/legisact

If you skip down to section 2c you will find the three part summary as defined by the U.S. government.

They don't really care what our opinion happens to be.

----------


## DOGMAN

> ... an expanse of geography wherein non-human species and their ecosystems rule much more than humans...


From my understanding that is the classic definition of wilderness.  From the Webster dictionary:   _an area essentially undisturbed by human activity together with its naturally developed life community_


By that definition there is little wilderness, or perhaps no "true" wilderness left in the lower 48 states.  Animals that need deep "wilderness" in order to survive- wolverines, lynx, mountain caribou are all about gone from the lower 48.  There are some remnant populations but their numbers are so few they will not survive without humans re-introducing more.  Then the larger carnivores- grizzly bears and wolves only inhabit a tiny fraction of their historic ranges.  Grizzly Bears don't even have a resident, breeding population in the largest designated Wilderness Area in the lower 48 states.  The places that do have resident populations of large carnivores (Yellowstone and Glacier National Parks and the surrounding Wilderness Areas) are so heavily managed, that the animals can't hardly leave the public lands and move about naturally upon the landscape without being killed, or relocated.  If a Grizzly leaves Federal land in the lower 48 it is almost always killed- thats pretty much the same for wolves.

The rest of the west- Colorado, most of Wyoming, and Idaho, New Mexico etc...do not have all their historic native predators- so they are not "in-tact ecosystems" so although they have designated Wilderness Areas- by the classic definition, they can't truly be wilderness areas....

So, like I said in the earlier posts-  we may think places are wild- but to the historic native species that belong their, they are inhabitable due to humans

----------


## WalkingTree

(kyratshooter) That's not a bad definition. Agree with dogman also, etc.

It should be obvious that if we get too technical, it becomes gray. For some elements of a wilderness, it's gone or is more like their "reservation" that we try to confine them to. Others...their ranges and lifestyle extends into the human world successfully. And still others...wouldn't be there in the first place if it weren't for humans - aren't "native". So wilderness is still affected by humans in some way. However, there should still be some kind of threshold beyond which we say that it's a wilderness, and before which we say that it isn't. Even though that threshold can be a bit fuzzy.

One might even use the definitive of whether or not a human can survive within said area for any extended period by use of any permanent or semi permanent facility placed in the area by humans.

----------


## DOGMAN

> The term "wilderness" has a legal definition, and it does not eliminate the entire lower 48 states.  
> 
> http://www.wilderness.net/nwps/legisact
> 
> If you skip down to section 2c you will find the three part summary as defined by the U.S. government.
> 
> They don't really care what our opinion happens to be.


so from that site:  "A wilderness, in contrast with those areas where man and his own works dominate the landscape, is hereby recognized as an area where the earth and its community of life are untrammeled by man"....

So now- prove me wrong.  Find places in the lower 48 that have all their plant and animal communities in-tact.  Places that humans have not driven plant or animal communities to extinction or at least out of that area...By their own definition- wilderness areas aren't true wilderness- simply because the natural communities have trammeled by humans

----------


## kyratshooter

You guys are stopping at the first section of the definition and not considering parts 2,3,4.

(2) has outstanding opportunities for solitude or a primitive and unconfined type of recreation; (3) has at least five thousand acres of land or is of sufficient size as to make practicable its preservation and use in an unimpaired condition; and (4) may also contain ecological, geological, or other features of scientific, educational, scenic, or historical value.

Number 2 has no specification for distance from the nearest town and describes a host of areas in the eastern U.S.

Number 3 is #2 with 5000 acres.  

That 4th definition is a real kicker and might include a half acre apple orchard with historical value!

By including a requirement for lack of habitation you fellows are actually confusing the definition of wilderness with the definition of a frontier, which is an area with less then 2 people per square mile.

Lack of human intrusion get one back to the old thing about "If a tree falls in the woods and there is not one there does it make any noise?"

If no one is allowed to go there it is of no use to anyone because no one can enter to use it.  According to your definition as soon as a human enters the area it is no longer a wilderness.

----------


## WalkingTree

> You guys are stopping at the first section of the definition and not considering parts 2,3,4.


Did not. I read it all.




> According to your definition as soon as a human enters the area it is no longer a wilderness.


Not mine. Huh-uh. I said "whether or not a human can survive within said area for any extended period by use of any permanent or semi permanent facility placed in the area by humans".

I usually think of a frontier as a place which doesn't have human law-and-order of a certain fashion. "Wild" in that way. But also a kind of wilderness.

But anyway. You're right. We all are right. There are legal definitions, which is to say that a certain authority or body deemed such-and-such, and there are other ways to think of things...subjective to what is being talked about and what the intention is.

But, I may never think of a half acre apple orchard with historical value...as a wilderness area. No matter what the official legal definition is. Besides, I don't think it implies that said orchard would *be* a wilderness...but that an orchard may be *within* a wilderness area.

----------


## WalkingTree

Let's just hope this remains fiction:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TckJBvl_uT0

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6WVspvb3c3o

----------


## Rick

That's some heavy ship man. Am I drivin' okay?

----------


## Faiaoga

> Let's just hope this remains fiction:
> 
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TckJBvl_uT0
> 
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6WVspvb3c3o


Like wow, when this Silent Running (1972) film came out I managed to miss it 
- I had begun living in a Third World village where people lived on taro from the plantation and fish from the reef.  They had not yet  advanced to MacDonalds and Walmart, but they are steadily catching up.   

The Bruce Dern character seems a bit intense, but I can see his point.  It is hard to convince people who think fruit comes wrapped in cellophane that a cantaloupe could come from a seed, soil, sun and rain.   :Thumbup1: 
Thank for posting the film clip.

----------


## DOGMAN

> You guys are stopping at the first section of the definition and not considering parts 2,3,4.
> 
> (2) has outstanding opportunities for solitude or a primitive and unconfined type of recreation; (3) has at least five thousand acres of land or is of sufficient size as to make practicable its preservation and use in an unimpaired condition; and (4) may also contain ecological, geological, or other features of scientific, educational, scenic, or historical value.
> 
> Number 2 has no specification for distance from the nearest town and describes a host of areas in the eastern U.S.
> 
> Number 3 is #2 with 5000 acres.  
> 
> That 4th definition is a real kicker and might include a half acre apple orchard with historical value!
> ...


I'm not sure of exactly who you are talking to here, because the definition I used does not state, "that as soon as a human enters the area it is no longer a wilderness" 

However, I would like to go deeper into the issue regardless ...

First off- you are using the 1964 Federal Wilderness Act to define Wilderness.  However, that is short-sighted because Wilderness existed before 1964- before the act...  Prior to that, wilderness was defined as I stated earlier.  Basically primordial wild lands unaltered by humans, lands containing their natural plant and animal communities.  Then the act, set aside certain areas as "designated wilderness areas" with the intent to preserve them, and to even rehabilitate them in certain circumstances- to try and return them to their primordial state.  Not all lands in the act where seen as "wilderness" they just were thought to have enough Wilderness character that they could perhaps some day return to their natural state.  At the time the act was passed virtually all the lands in the lower 48 included had roads through them, mines, signs of logging etc.  But it was believed if human inhabitation and exploitation was banned then they would return to their natural state on their own.  So, by the act - many lands that are now called Federal "Wilderness Areas" are protected as wilderness, but actually don't meet the classic definition of "wilderness" yet...

Now back to what the original poster said, "there is very little Wilderness left in the lower 48 states"...he did not say "Federally designated Wilderness Areas".  So, by the classic definition I tend to agree with him.

This year 1,000 Bison were slated to be culled near Yellowstone by the Federal Government - because they are not allowed to follow their natural migrations in and out of the Nationa Parks and Wilderness areas of the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem.  Each year 20-50 grizzly bears are killed in the Northern Rockies due to management and human interactions- even though they are still on the Endangered Species list.  Since the act was passed wolverines, Lynx and caribou have all but vanished from the wilderness areas of the Rockies.  Why?  Because there simply aren't enough wild lands to maintain their populations.

We can continue to keep our heads in the sand, and believe that there is true wilderness in the lower 48, or we can open our eyes and begin to understand the importance of large track conservation and perhaps still save our countries wildlife heritage in the process...

----------


## WalkingTree

Silent Running is a good movie.

----

I feel like this post would be a continuation of something I was talking about in post #15 here -

http://www.wilderness-survival.net/f...nd-Pasteurians

We may need to do something along the lines of a suggestion made by Edward O. Wilson, elucidated in his book 'Half Earth' -

http://www.amazon.com/Half-Earth-Our.../dp/1631490826

(click the 'read more')

You Tube -

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zq3w7cldgMU

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7ANire8E240

Also -

https://nature.berkeley.edu/breakthr...half-the-earth

http://www.smithsonianmag.com/scienc...952379/?no-ist

More on Edward O. Wilson -

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E._O._Wilson

----------


## Mr.Shrooms

[QUOTE]Let's just hope this remains fiction:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TckJBvl_uT0

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6WVspvb3c3o[QUOTE]

I hope it does remain fiction, can you imagine the ramifications of a card playing robot. You think a good pokerface is hard to read, that robot didn't have a face at all, and no emotions. Nobody had a clue it was just sitting on a full house. As for the wilderness. Recently I was in the hickory creek wilderness.  Its small (8663 acres)but when I got inside it was good enough for me to enjoy. Is it real wilderness? Maybe not but didn't bother me when all I could hear was running water and birds singing.

----------


## WalkingTree

"The great fault of all ethics hitherto has been that they believed themselves to have to deal only with the relations of man to man. In reality, however, the question is what is his attitude to the world and all life that comes within his reach. A man is ethical only when life, as such, is sacred to him, that of plants and animals as that of his fellow men, and when he devotes himself helpfully to all life that is in need of help."

- Albert Schweitzer

http://www.spiritualityandpractice.c...pts/view/14836

----------


## Rick

Oppenheimer Funds is currently running a commercial that says by 2025 all homes will have robots in them. So....get ready. 

https://www.ispot.tv/ad/A1Ta/oppenhe...n-is-beautiful

----------


## Faiaoga

Thanks for pointing out the E O Wilson book Half-Earth (2016?).  I will try to find it.  The few section I have been able to look up indicate that our present geological age needs to be called the Anthropocene (Plasticicene or Syntheticene) Yes, future geologists will identify our era by the layer of plastic wrappers and computer chips they find.  The really frightening thing is that Wilson wants to conserve half the earth for nature while admitting that world human population may soon reach 11 billion  :Helpsmilie: 

I still haven't seen the Silent Running film but I wonder if space colonies and satellites may not be too far off .
Meanwhile, we can develop more game shows and home shopping networks :Helpsmilie:

----------


## WalkingTree

(Faiaoga) Yes...one hard reality and the options for addressing it, which few want to face or admit to knowing or comment on, is the fact that there are so many of us and will be many more very quickly...despite any future technological advances or changes in societal structures, you can't solve the problem by just developing more land for one use or the other. At some point, we run out of land. Period. You can't wait until then to find another approach, it needs to be done now. And it's not only about the square footage that we directly inhabit or use for agriculture or other purposes, etc...it's not that simple. So much more is going on, such that more land and more than human related activities is required for the whole system to survive, and we're already very close to our limit and point of no return.

You can label this thinking, you can stigmatize it, you can blame the messengers, you can whine and put the messenger on the spot and make them responsible for coming up with a solution...but it's there nonetheless. Inevitably. And everyone needs to face it, and take responsibility for addressing it however it needs to be.

I am all for space/off-earth endeavors, but that kind of thing is not going to help us either any time soon. It won't work like that. Whether we become able to exist off-earth and elsewhere or not, the human condition and situation on earth has to be revolutionized nonetheless. And now. Or else.

----------


## Manwithnoname

I read the initial post and saw it was by a banned member who's other posts I've read have never impressed me none. I was about to just forget the whole thing until I read the last couple of sentences which I cannot let slide for my 4 legged friends. Hopefully someone else already addressed it but I'm not reading all the pages to find out, the initial post was enough for me but I've got to make sure the record is set straight. Not just horses, but equines in general can sneak right up behind you in complete stealth scaring the bejesus out of you when leaning in over your shoulder to see what's up or stealing your hat or grabbing a good hold on your coat knowing there ain't a thing you can do about it to get away until he's ready to let you go. I swear I heard him laughing!!

----------


## Batch

Using man as a marker for the supernatural influence on an environment suspends the truth. We are a natural creature of evolution.

The example of the American bison's rise and fall and resurgence. Native American cultivation practices involved clearing forests with fire. This created better grazing lands for bison whose numbers exploded. 

Towards the end of the precolumbian period a plague hit the natives. Most of the inhabitants of North America died before the pilgrims arrived. That left vast agricultural lands and cleared lands left to graising animals and a population bomb went off. 

Florida has been inhabited by man for at least 12,500 years. The glades were a desert then and most of the villages were off of Florida's modern coast in forests that have lied under water for thousands of years now. The glades started forming about 4,000 years ago. And resembled their precolumbian state around 2,500 ago. The folks that were here when Hernando DeSoto came through left in the 1700's and the Miccosukee and Seminole people replaced them a hundred years later in very small numbers. 50 people in the 1850's.

Flash forward over 100 years and they went from a wild people to federally recognized tribes. They chose that route of recognition over just living in the glades because we cut the hydrology of the glades with the Tamiami Trail in the late 1920's.

We have had a greater and greater influence on the land. But, given that an estimated 99.9% of all organisms that have lived have gone extinct. It is a good bet we are all temporary.

We had a thread here that defined a wilderness as so far from the paved road. I think 14 miles. If you hike in 5 miles or 10 miles you are still getting it done! Have fun and screw the labels!

----------


## WalkingTree

> Using man as a marker for the supernatural influence on an environment suspends the truth.


What does this part mean?

----------


## One

You have to own a piece of land or ask the government permission(A.K.A. State parks) camp on it.. let alone live. You just need to find secret spots that nobody knows of and you'l be fine to practice your bush-craft. Just pretend you got dropped behind enemy lines during Vietnam, lay low and leave a small foot print. If you get caught just pretend your lost.. so you don't become a POW.

Just don't let them catch you with wild carrots in your mouth.

----------


## hunter63

> You have to own a piece of land or ask the government permission(A.K.A. State parks) camp on it.. let alone live. You just need to find secret spots that nobody knows of and you'l be fine to practice your bush-craft. Just pretend you got dropped behind enemy lines during Vietnam, lay low and leave a small foot print. If you get caught just pretend your lost.. so you don't become a POW.
> 
> Just don't let them catch you with wild carrots in your mouth.


So, You are suggesting trespassing?

----------


## Batch

> What does this part mean?


We have people who define wilderness as untouched by man as if man is not natural. We treat ourselves as if we are not a natural creature.

Then people try to define wilderness as untouched by man when man has lived there for millennia.

----------


## WalkingTree

> We have people who define wilderness as untouched by man as if man is not natural. We treat ourselves as if we are not a natural creature.
> 
> Then people try to define wilderness as untouched by man when man has lived there for millennia.


Yea...but that's why I use this approach to how to think of it -



> ...an expanse of geography wherein non-human species and their ecosystems rule much more than humans, and there is very little or no climate control taking place.


It's a matter of our place in nature...exactly *how* we do things, *how* we affect things, and *how much*. When we've been in a place before, and things changed because of our presence...it was still there. And by 'it', I mean some form of self-sustaining natural system to some degree. But we're getting closer and closer to this not being the case...affecting and changing things so that 'natural' systems don't exist or operate anymore.

Viruses and bacteria have always existed in our bodies. They have been here before. Are still here right now. But when we have a case of a virus or bacteria trying to kill a person, we don't disregard the incident and let that person die by saying "they have always been here, so it's nothing to worry about. That person's body (aka 'wilderness') is still there, even though it's actually dead now".

----------


## LowKey

Last spring I had to clear about 20 hemlock trees of varying sizes off a small portion of my property.
Dead due to an imported invasive adelgid. The ones in the state forest behind me are a standing fire hazard.

Saturday I went for a long drive across the state. Every single white pine I saw had some form of wilt. There were sections of hillsides well off the roads that were completely dead brown. People here are blaming salt damage or old-tree stress or maybe borers introducing stain fungus. All of them. Betting most will be dead by August. The ones that aren't probably won't make the winter.

Man and his ability to travel globally within hours has totally changed the face of this earth whether he has walked into an area or not. Nothing here is untouched by man.

More and more food crops are being attacked by traveling insects and diseases. Orange tree greening? Cavendish bananas? The seriousness of bee colony decline?

The issue of overpopulation cannot be discussed. There is no monetary incentive for having fewer consumers in the world. We'd much rather sell Cap&Trade or more fertilizer, more GMOs and more Roundup, or more land to housing developments and solar farms, tobacco fields and cane plantations. A world where all of nature is considered less important than feeding one more man. 
I'm hoping the world can hold out for another 25-30 years.
But I do feel sorry for the kids today.

----------


## kyratshooter

Where to place the blame???

I remember a few years back when the pine forests of Tennessee were turning into wasteland.  Standing dead trees for miles.

Acid rain generated in Memphis and Nashville was blamed and the federal and state governments jumped on the pollution prevention bandwagon, closing smokestacks and turning people out of work in "pollution generating businesses" by the thousands, muzzling our car engines, raising the cost of vehicles and gasoline.

Then some observant young grad student from one of the local colleges discovered the southern pine beetle was the culprit.  Nothing humans had anything to do with.

Apparently no one that knew "jack" had ever examined the trees, they had simply jumped on the latest and greatest social trend because it fit their needs.

I play that "this used to all be woods and fields" game as I drive down the road, but not as I drive through the Federal and State wilderness areas.  In fact, those areas are growing as people and companies donate more land to offset some that they have used in the past.  You give a company a good tax break and you would be amazed at what they will do to grab it.

I know that Ohio boasts hundreds of thousands of acres of ReCreation project land.  I have camped on that land, hunted on it and fished the lakes.  And almost every other piece of "National Forest", including the Great Smoky Mountains, was bought from private ownership and placed in public trust.

While out west much of the land now seen as public property was never owned by anyone and the fight was to keep it out of private hands, here in the east our public use land is growing each year.

I know it is hard to believe but east of the Mississippi River almost 1/3 of the land is owned/controlled by Federal, State or local governments.  The number jumps to 50% of the land west of the Mississippi.

Most of it will never be seen as long as one stares down the blank page we call the interstate highway system, because all the off ramps look the same.

----------

