Stories from the Leopold shack: sand county revisited

Description

Published in 1948, Aldo Leopold's A Sand County Almanac has become an enduring and beloved American classic. More than that, it is rightly seen as one of the foundational texts of the conservation movement. Starting in 1934 and continuing over the course of a dozen or so years, Leopold and his family-including his five children-restored a farm and surrounding lands in south-central Wisconsin. Working together, they put into practice Leopold's "land ethic" involving ecological restoration and sustainability. In the process, they built more than a habitable family shelter or pleasant weekend getaway; they established a new way of relating to nature. In this reflection on the Shack and its inhabitants, Estella B. Leopold, the youngest of Aldo's children, recalls with clear-eyed fondness the part the Shack played in their burgeoning awareness of nature's miracles, season by season. Life at the Shack is recalled vividly and unforgettably: the taste of fresh honey (with honey comb) on sourdough pancakes; the trumpeting arrival of migrating Canada geese; the awesome power of river ice driven by currents. Each improvement to the Shack, whether a new fireplace or a privy, constituted a triumph. As they worked to restore degraded farmland into its original prairie and woods, the Leopolds noted and celebrated all of the flora and fauna that came to share the Shack lands. As first evoked in A Sand County Almanac, and now in Sand County Revisited, the Leopold family's efforts were among the earliest in ecological restoration in the United States, and their work, collectively and individually, continues to have a profound impact on land management and conservationism. All of Aldo Leopold's children went on to become distinguished scientists and to devote themselves to a life of conservation; their work continues through the Aldo Leopold Foundation. Estella Leopold's intimate and endearing book offers a trip back to the place where it all began.