Landscape Amnesia and Wilderness By Howie Wolke

The eons attest that wilderness, more than any other kind of landscape, is the real world, today a still living vestige of three and a half billion years of organic evolution, the fundamental fabric upon which all life and all economies – human and not – are based.

As the terrifying and strange new world of the 21^st century unfolds, the role of conservationists in resuscitating the essence of the Wilderness Idea becomes more crucial than ever. I say terrifying because what’s more frightful than the specter of radical human-induced climate change (global warming) wreaking havoc with most every natural and artificial environment from New Orleans to the polar ice caps? And I say strange partly because overwhelming and irrefutable evidence asserts that most of our problems, including the demise of wilderness, stem – either directly or indirectly – from human overpopulation. Yet in America, the environmental and conservation movements are usually too timid to discuss this wayward monster.

I mention the twin terrors of overpopulation and global warming in this essay about wilderness simply because all of us need to constantly remind each other and the rest of our society that these dragons must be slayed or eventually there’ll be no wilderness as we know it, however strong our conservation efforts become. Nonetheless, here in America, I see an equal albeit less obvious threat to real wilderness.

As Lowbagger readers know, there are many obvious threats to both de-facto and designated Wilderness, from bulldozers and chainsaws and ATV’s to various manifestations of poor stewardship in protected Wilderness Areas.  One particularly insidious threat is lurking within society’s outlook toward wild landscapes. I call it “Landscape Amnesia”. Landscape Amnesia is a disease of modern generations of humans who lack a collective memory of healthy landscapes. What I’m talking about is real landscape-derived memory, not merely remembering landscapes via the printed or photographic record.

Speaking regionally, we westerners are now two full centuries removed from the days of Lewis and Clark, which ushered in rapid European colonization of the West along with massive habitat destruction and wildlife extermination. So roughly 10-12 generations (more in Utah) have expired since Lewis and Clark first saw the unbelievably teeming and mostly pristine western wilderness. Even more generations have come and gone in the East since its landscape was first hacked up and chopped down by colonists. As we know, what modern generations see when they gaze upon both rural and wild landscapes, is a far cry from what the early Europeans saw. The ramifications of this extend deep into the psyche of modern society -- including the conservation movement --and our relationship with the land.

First, one might ask how modern land managers and landowners might attempt to restore damaged habitats when nobody remains alive who remembers the pristine lands and the forces that shaped them?  Cottonwood floodplain forests, tall grass prairies and old growth Appalachian forests are examples of once expansive ecosystems that have been nearly obliterated. Multi-million acre expanses of completely undeveloped pristine roadless weedless wilderness with all native species and natural processes thriving are likewise nearly extinct. Time marches on. Those who remember the old places die. Gradually the depleted condition becomes the perceived norm. Wasn’t most of Nevada always sagebrush and dirt? Didn’t this stream always dry up each summer? Wasn’t this mountain always covered with puny trees? Weren’t cottonwoods and willows always absent from this floodplain? And isn’t the Bob Marshall Wilderness as wild as ever? Landscape amnesia prevents us from seeing the sad truths behind such questions.

When it comes to designated Wilderness, landscape amnesia allows us to accept a broad array of insults that are increasingly common in “protected” Wilderness. Ranger cabins, air strips, outfitter caches, weed infestations, fire suppression, predator control, smog, fences, motor vehicle corridors, eroded multi-laned trails, denuded over-used campsites, stock bridges, stock tanks, jet boats and more have become part of the modern “wilderness experience”, all as we bathe in the illusion that such incongruities don’t seriously detract from wilderness character. Granted, not all of these incongruities occur in each Wilderness area, but every Wilderness I’ve ever visited includes varying levels of some. And the trend isn’t improving. Modern generations increasingly accept these insults simply because they’ve never experienced Wilderness without them.

Worse, too many conservation activists – who should know better –accept and ignore these insults viewing them as minor, in order to placate Wilderness opposition.  In my opinion, if more of our colleagues spent more time in the wilds and less at their computer screens, they’d be more concerned about the Wilderness degradation.

As President of Wilderness Watch, a national Missoula, Montana-based non-profit conservation group focused upon fostering proper stewardship of existing designated Wilderness, I’m proud to work with folks who realize that Wilderness Areas are to be managed as unique bastions of primitive America, “in contrast with those areas where man and his works dominate the landscape” (1964 Wilderness Act, section 2-c), and where “wilderness character” (Wilderness Act, multiple sections) is to be maintained or enhanced, not compromised. This is both a point of law and the very essence of the Wilderness Idea. Thus, in 1964 Congress proved that the phrase “Congressional Wisdom” isn’t always oxymoronic. That’s the year Congress enacted both the Wilderness Act and the Civil Rights Act. As one whose youth was spent partly in the pre-civil rights South, I witnessed first hand the degradation of the human spirit that accompanies institutionalized racism.

Similarly, as a professional wilderness guide and outfitter in the western U.S. and Alaska for nearly 30 years, I’ve witnessed the widespread degradation of wilderness character, an inevitable tragedy whenever humans accept the various forms of on the ground mischief so antithetical to the Wilderness Idea. Trust me, our protected Wildernesses are, for the most part, becoming less wild. That’s why a few years ago I got involved with Wilderness Watch. Indeed, Wilderness Watch is the only conservation organization whose basic mission is to keep protected Wilderness Areas wild!  Although I’m proud of the typically successful work this organization does defending Wilderness in the legal arena, I suspect that our greatest contribution is simply being here to remind society, including fellow conservationists, that some landscapes, especially our wildest, just shouldn’t be compromised. So here’s a shameless plea for Lowbagger readers to support a really worthy organization: Please join Wilderness Watch (www.wildernesswatch.org), and while you’re at it sign up a friend or three. Your hard-earned greenbacks will be used efficiently and our Wilderness ultimately will be wilder!

Landscape Amnesia is an insidious threat both to Wilderness Areas on the ground and to the Wilderness Idea. By now, most Wilderness users have come to accept many of the incongruities listed earlier as simply coming with the territory. There’s no collective memory of anything else. As future generations experience “Wilderness” as a compromised imitation of the real thing, the essence of the Wilderness Idea will die. As ideas die, so do actions based upon those ideas. And without action by those who care, there can be no wilderness in the modern world. We have, after all, entered the century in which the only remaining wild landscapes will be those that we choose to protect. Part of that choice is how well we’ll protect the chosen lands.

So let us never forget that the essence of Wilderness and the glue that binds the Wilderness Idea is the un-compromised wildness and naturalness of self-willed land. If we fail in our lifetimes to preserve and restore where necessary the basic character of our Wilderness Areas (lands with our highest level of protection), then we also fail to provide future generations with the information – a baseline -- required to foster a commitment to real Wilderness.

In my opinion, Wilderness is civilization’s best idea. In an increasingly crowded, industrialized and unstable future, real wilderness will thrive only if we today have the wisdom to include vast acreages of wild lands in the Wilderness System, and to care for those lands the way Congress intended when it enacted the Wilderness Act of 1964. Otherwise, landscape amnesia guarantees that real wilderness will fade into the distant dimming memory of a species of primate that’s often too clever for its own good.

Longtime wilderness guide, conservationist and writer Howie Wolke is currently the President of Wilderness Watch.