“In the end we will conserve only what we love, we will love only what we understand, and we will understand only what we are taught.” Senegalese environmentalist and forestry engineer, Baba Dioum, 1937
I recently renewed my membership in Trout Unlimited, and got to wondering if my supporting that organization over the years has actually helped the planet. I do love to fly fish, but have found it gradually more difficult when I hook a fish. Once caught, it becomes a race with time to get the fish safely off the hook and back into the stream. I love standing in the cold water, feeling connected to the stream, but I have mixed emotions. Fishing is one of the things that woke me up to nature at an early age and has brought me back again and again. It is one of the things that taught me to love and appreciate wild places and the natural world. But I get conflicted over the damage I am doing to the fish. I wonder about the morality of what I am doing. I learned to love streams, rivers and bodies of water through fishing, but has this love encouraged me to protect and conserve these things? Should I teach my granddaughter to fish as a way to help her love them too?
“People protect what they love”. This line comes from Jacques Cousteau and is much quoted. It is often confused with the quote from Baba Dioum, but seems to have been made without knowledge of Mr. Dioum. His son told how Jacques said this to him when they had just released a rescued sea otter named Cacha. He turned to his son, full of emotion, and said, “Jean-Michel, people protect what they love”. It became one of the mottos of his father’s work. Aldo Leopold wrote: “We only grieve what we love”. Wendell Berry wrote something similar too: “People exploit what they have merely concluded to be of value, but they defend what they love, and to defend what we love we need a particularizing language, for we love what we particularly know.” Each statement is a little more complicated than my dilemma with fishing and I could take issue with some of the thoughts. I don’t, for example, think we love only what we understand, as I am sure I don’t fully understand many of the people I love. However, I agree with the basic idea, that when we know and love something, we seek to take care of it.
In a microcosm, my dilemma is the same as that of organizations such as Trout Unlimited that do a great deal of good protecting fish and fishing streams, but also promote a sport that harms those creatures. I have operated on the assumption that people who hunt and fish learn to love our natural resources and though they damage and even kill other species, their love of the sport has helped preserve those resources. Out of curiosity I looked up so see what other organization there are like Trout Unlimited. I found a staggering number of groups doing similar work as Trout Unlimited. To name a few: Pheasants Forever, National wild turkey federation, Boone and Crockett club, Delta Waterfowl Organization, International Game Association, U.S. Sportsmans’ Alliance, Ruffed Grouse Society, Mule Deer Foundation, Quality Deer Management Foundation, Safari Club International, Whitetails Unlimited and Ducks Unlimited. Many of the organizations state on their websites admirable dedication to the preservation and conservation of natural resources and commitment to use the best available science to enable their work. I was heartened to see that some even address climate change as part of their mission. Another advantage of these organizations, though I admit with is mostly conjecture on my part, is that they are supported by both liberals and conservatives and may therefore have clout politically.
I guess I am really asking two quite different, but related questions: one – do we protect and conserve what we love and, two – does hunting and fishing and the organizations that support them, encourage people to love nature and therefore protect, defend and conserve it? The first one is easier, as I do think that anything that gets us out in nature helps us learn to love it. Birdwatching, gardening, hiking, backpacking, skiing, snowshoeing, camping, and yes, hunting and fishing, definitely teach children and adults to love the natural world. Folks who are out in nature the most, such as guides, forest rangers and scientists who study nature are often the most passionate about defending the natural world. There are all kinds of arguments for getting children out of town and onto the farm, the boat, the campground or the hiking trail as a way of leading them to health, wholeness and respect for the cosmos. But the environmental argument is the one that concerns me today, and without a doubt, catching crawfish and fishing for Blue Gill in Plum Creek as boy helped awaken in me a communion with nature that sustains me today and leads me to action on behalf of the environment. Aldo Leopold noted: “Perhaps no one but a hunter can understand how intense an affection a boy can feel for a piece of marsh…. I came home one Christmas to find that land promoters, with the help of the Corps of Engineers had dyked and drained my boyhood hunting grounds on the Mississippi river bottoms…. My hometown thought the community enriched by this change. I thought it impoverished.” Draft foreword, A Sand County Almanac, in Companion to a Sand County Almanac.
The second part is harder, do organizations formed to help preserve fishing streams and hunting grounds actually help preserve them while at the same time encouraging people to hurt and sometimes kill the animals they are hunting? On the website for Trout Unlimited they state as part of their history: “From the beginning, TU was guided by the principle that if we ‘take care of the fish, then the fishing will take care of itself.’ And that principle was grounded in science. ‘One of our most important objectives is to develop programs and recommendations based on the very best information and thinking available,’ said TU’s first president, Dr. Casey E. Westell Jr. ‘In all matters of trout management, we want to know that we are substantially correct, both morally and biologically.’” I learned in researching this essay that in 1937 it was supporters of hunting and fishing who successfully lobbied Congress to pass the Pittman-Robertson Wildlife Restoration Act, which put an excise tax on the sale of all sporting arms and ammunition. In 1950, the Dingell-Johnson Act extended this to fishing equipment. Even today, all purchases of hunting and fishing equipment contribute to this fund that is used to conserve wildlife habitat. Combined with the funding from state license and tag sales for hunting and fishing and a substantial part of funding for wildlife preservation comes from these sources that came into being through the efforts of groups such as Trout Unlimited. There was a study done by researchers at Clemson and Cornell Universities that found that “wildlife recreationists”, hunters and birdwatchers, were four to five times more likely than non-recreationists to work for conservation activities such as donating to local efforts or encouraging wildlife habitat on public lands (The Journal of Wildlife Management, March, 2015).
I’m still torn about this. I wish, in the best of all possible worlds, that humans could learn to love the outdoors without needing to stalk, injure and sometimes kill wild creatures. There is this fascination, however, with hunting and fishing that I suspect has to do with our cultural backgrounds and perhaps even our genetics. In the short run, at least, I think supporting hunting and fishing organizations is an expedient way to help the planet. We do protect what we love, and many people who hunt and fish deeply love the places, experiences and creatures they seek in these activities. Many hunt and fish with great respect and care for these things. Aldo Leopold wrote in Sand County Almanac, “Examine each question in terms of what is ethically and esthetically right, as well as what is economically expedient. A thing is right when it tends to preserve the integrity, stability, and beauty of the biotic community. It is wrong when it tends otherwise.” If Aldo Leopold is a judge (I’d say he’s as good as any) I would say organizations such as Trout Unlimited do help “preserve the integrity, stability, and beauty of the biotic community”. Will I teach my granddaughter to fish? If she is interested, yes, I guess I would, but it will be catch and release with barbless hooks.