LNT PRINCIPALS - Do You Agree?

[JAK]

Aha. More fibre. I suppose dry sawdust might work also.

I understand bones can be burned also if the fire is hot enough. Burning clean wood will
give you potash. Burning bones will give you bone ash. Burning poop, not sure, ass ash?

[Summit]

Leave only footprints, take only pictures.

To 'leave only footprints' involves packing out your crap and TP! Do you do that?

I pack and use a trowel when not near a shelter privy, but I'll be honest, when I gotta go bad and the ground isn't cooperating with digging very deep, I do the best I can and then make sure my business is covered real well when done. As someone said, I think the decomposing of TP takes place faster when it gets a little air (but not left visible on top of the ground).

As for LNT principles, I agree in principle, but I don't get anal about it. Use common sense. Treat water sources the way you would want the folks there recently before you to have treated them. Leave campsites in as good a condition or better than the state you found them in, etc.

[buff_jeff]

I like what summit said, I'm an advocate of common sense...

[River Runner]

This month's issue of Backpacker got my testosterone going again. Although I can agree on most of the principals, now they want you to dig a 8 inch cathole for your wash water. Now after years of walking well away from camp and spreading wide and far I need to dig a hole? Has anyone here tried to dig a 8 inch hole with a orange plastic junk trowel? The last time I "cat-holed" some grease & wash water outside of camp I was "Surrounded" by large skunks in NH. Sometimes I find some of LNT just plain stupid.

Lets see if anyone else has an issue with a LNT principal.

Oh FYI there is a big article on the AT this month - Haven't read it yet.

Hey Wise Old Owl,

Did you read the backpacker article?

The way you have presented it is not the way the article is written.

Backpacker did a reader survey on how they dispose of dirty dishwater, and 42% said they pour it into a cathole at least eight inches deep.

Backpacker then goes on to say that the preferred method, favored by hardcore Leave No Trace advocates is to drink the gray water. And they go on to say that it is okay to strain out the chunks then scatter the water.

You might want to read closer the next time before you state something as a Leave No Trace principal that isn't.

[Dirtygaiters]

To 'leave only footprints' involves packing out your crap and TP! Do you do that?

Letter of the law vs Spirit of the law. Since LNT is by no means a law, I think there's a much stronger case to be made for intelligent interpretation.

Example: In an eastern hardwood forest that gets a lot of rain and has a long growing season, decomposition rates are going to be very high and since you can pick any old spat of ground to do your business, dispersal is also very high. Meaning, in short, that not only are other people unlikely to find your waste, but even the TP will decompose in a year or less, so there's not a huge lasting impact.

At the other extreme, consider that you're on the saddle of any popular mountain in the west, above treeline. It's cold and rocky enough in such a place that decomposition rates are extremely low, and given that a place like that sees a lot of human traffic, safe dispersal is also pretty low. Even if you do hide your cathole, chances are high that someone will come along and discover it before it decomposes. However, because decomposition rates are so low above treeline, both the human waste and the TP would likely remain relatively intact for many years to come, both as obvious litter and as a contaimation to the water table.

Therefore, when just hiking through the woods, I tend to leave my waste on top of the ground or in the upper few inches of soil. However, if I find myself above treeline when nature calls, particularly on a popular mountain, I will definitely pack it out.

[take-a-knee]

It's hard to figure where LNT fits into southeast backpacking while surrounded with near constant jets overhead and the endless whine of motorcycles on the roads below the ridges. You may bury your poop 8 inches down and slant each turd 10 degrees to the left and boil your toilet paper down to a mush, but meanwhile the 75 acres across the ridge is being bulldozed for roads and clearcut for logging trucks.

Maybe it's important for you to carry out your own waste and urine while moving thru a soupy mix of toxic air covering the TN valley from Virginia to Georgia. The rigorous backpacker may leave no trace, but the jackals all around his postage stamp "wilderness" are doing all in their power to smoke up more foul air and cut more roads. And yes, even a few of them pull out of their rolling couch-potato cars long enough to befoul whatever they can reach on food. If humans are fire ants, our purpose as seen from an objective observor from above must be to soil and cement what little is left.

Whenever LNT is brought up, I think of a guy swatting off a fly while a rhino is charging. And exactly how does one get motivated to practice LNT when confronted with the AT shelter system? Aren't firerings supposed to be removed? Aren't camps supposed to be far off the trail? Aren't we supposed to camp many yards from water? Shelters for the most part ignore these rules. And the shelters themselves leave a big troubling trace.

You know Tipi, I really think you are a nice guy, and I hope to meet you someday, but you really need to quit reading all that earth first propaganda, you might really "nut up" someday if you don't.

Don't worry about the bulldozers, the tumbling DOW will silence them for quite a while.

[Wags]

the reason shelters are in existance is to minimize the # of random campsites set up along the trail. it is 'bushwacking' and 'stealth camping' that so many people think is cool b/c they heard some douchebag say 'shelters suck omfg there's mice there' - but it really destroys a lot of environment, especially plant life. the 'bulldozing' tipi is talking about takes place whenever people stray off the trail and set up their tent outside of designated tent areas and spend a number of hours walking around on the immediate habitat. that is the LNT i am most concerned about. i can pick up someone else's garbage but i can't bring plants back to life someone killed by stepping on them or sleepign on them...

and i tend to disagree w/ tipi's argument. following his 'others are doing way worse than me' principle is a recipe for bad news and could lead to justification of nearly anything...

[Dirtygaiters]

the reason shelters are in existance is to minimize the # of random campsites set up along the trail. it is 'bushwacking' and 'stealth camping' that so many people think is cool b/c they heard some douchebag say 'shelters suck omfg there's mice there' - but it really destroys a lot of environment, especially plant life. the 'bulldozing' tipi is talking about takes place whenever people stray off the trail and set up their tent outside of designated tent areas and spend a number of hours walking around on the immediate habitat. that is the LNT i am most concerned about. i can pick up someone else's garbage but i can't bring plants back to life someone killed by stepping on them or sleepign on them...

Considering the fact that shelter system along the AT dates back to 60+ years ago when trail traffic was significantly less than it is today, I seriously doubt that.

If you think people only do 'stealth camping' and 'bushwacking' because they think it's cool, I think you're being extremely thick headed and thoughtless about a number of things. What you say about LNT is true, though. By carelessly trampling around a campsite, it's possible to leave a pretty big trace on the forest floor. However, this is not really an example of LNT, or stealth camping, just an example of an idiot needlessly trampling plants. It is possible to leave a virgin campsite looking just like you found it, most people just don't do it or know how to do it. The key... is not trampling plants in the first place. Sounds obvious, right? but it's actually possible if you can believe it.

As for going off trail causing a bulldozing effect on the environment, that's absolutely ridiculous. It's true that some leaves and sticks become displaced or broken, perhaps some spots of soil become compacted as well. These are "traces" in a certain sense. However, they are not unnatural traces. As long as there are deer, black bear, and other heavy quadrapeds that wander around off trail, leaving their own footprints on the forest floor that compact spots of soil and damage leaves on a daily basis, trust me, a few human footprints are not going to disrupt the natural order of things. The exception is if a lot of people keep walking in the same path back and forth, for instance from a campsite to a water source. This creates a "trail" which might last for a few years before becoming obscured by time and is definitely a trace. However, this is as easily avoided as trampling plants is: just try to take a different path each time you go to and from the water source. Simple as that.

By the way, if you're so concerned about plants, don't you know that those shelters you laud so highly were made of wood that was cut right out of the virgin forest? Those trees will never come back to life, and currently a bunch of people are sleeping on them and feeding mice that hide between them. I don't get how you can rationalize bemoaning the deaths of some plants but turning a blind eye to the slaughter of many others. Seems like a double standard to me.

[JAK]

I like what Summit said also. Golden Rule.

I also think LNT needs to be updated to better conform with our emerging better understanding of the science and ethics of sustainability.

Have I beaten that one to death yet?

[Tipi Walter]

You know Tipi, I really think you are a nice guy, and I hope to meet you someday, but you really need to quit reading all that earth first propaganda, you might really "nut up" someday if you don't.

Don't worry about the bulldozers, the tumbling DOW will silence them for quite a while.

Earth First propaganda? I suppose the only way a person could know if I'm spewing their rants is to have read their stuff. But no, the only brainwashing I get is from spending time with Miss Nature on her ridges and in her valleys. She meekly teaches and sometimes thunders. There's two choices before us: Wilderness or development. For several billion years Miss Nature produced wilderness in all its forms(some lethal to animals), and for several hundred thousands of years modern humans kept their numbers low and figured out symbiosis, living more or less in harmony with Miss Nature's edicts. Modern humans, somehow losing the wisdom needed for long-term survival on this planet and proving it by their numbers and behavior, seem to have made the choice for land exploitation and development and not for wilderness. Nearly every aspect of human life is now determined by over population, air pollution, and land disfigurement. Is this not apparent??

the reason shelters are in existance is to minimize the # of random campsites set up along the trail. it is 'bushwacking' and 'stealth camping' that so many people think is cool b/c they heard some douchebag say 'shelters suck omfg there's mice there' - but it really destroys a lot of environment, especially plant life. the 'bulldozing' tipi is talking about takes place whenever people stray off the trail and set up their tent outside of designated tent areas and spend a number of hours walking around on the immediate habitat. that is the LNT i am most concerned about. i can pick up someone else's garbage but i can't bring plants back to life someone killed by stepping on them or sleepign on them...

and i tend to disagree w/ tipi's argument. following his 'others are doing way worse than me' principle is a recipe for bad news and could lead to justification of nearly anything...

First off, the only bulldozing I'm talking about is actual bulldozing by bulldozers. There's no way it can be confused with foot traffic as real bulldozing cuts deep scars and leaves stumps. Has anyone seen a national forest mountainside crisscrossed with new logging roads? And it's happening very close to where backpackers camp and try to leave no trace. As I said before and let me repeat: "There's a slim chance that LNT will protect an area from within, but the much greater threat to an area is from without, especially as the population explodes while meanwhile the LNT types argue about graywater, creek bathing, toothpaste spit and uncontrolled pee spray."

How does this sentiment make it sound that others are doing way worse than me since we're all in this together?

[Wags]

just like you have, i gave my opinion about LNT

[Bob S]

LNT on the AT???


4,000,000 + people walk some part of the AT, I don’t think anyone can reasonably expect 4-million + people to leave no trace that they have been there.


Not to say people should not clean up after themselves and try to not destroy the outdoors. But tine and untouched is a foolish wish that is not based in reality.

[JAK]

Anyone else think the Leave No Trace mantra needs to be updated to speak more about Sustainability?

[Tin Man]

Anyone else think the Leave No Trace mantra needs to be updated to speak more about Sustainability?

NO! You are mixing apples, oranges and beaten down dead horses.

Time to move on... please.

[trouthunter]

LNT principles are good to a point, after that you have to think for yourself and try to follow the intent of the LNT principles and not necessarily the letter of the law.
Every region has different variables and concerns and restrictions.

LNT is a good concept, but one that can not be applied universally.
You have to educate your self and make decisions on your own sometimes. Also the environment is not nearly as fragile as a lot of people have been led to believe. That is not in any way meant be an excuse to trash the environment.
I lead a very environmentally friendly lifestyle, but some people accept everything they read put out by environmental groups as the holy gospel, when in fact many groups put out some very erroneous and misleading information in an effort to promote their cause.

[JAK]

Thanks for the feedback Tin Man. That is kind of what I was looking for. I agree with you, and with trouthunter. People need to study and work things out for themselves, not to contribute in their own way to trashing the environment, but to contribute in their own way to finding their own understanding and lasting solutions.

There, I did it without the dreaded 'S' word.

[Mags]

To 'leave only footprints' involves packing out your crap and TP! Do you do that?

You can make a simple statement complicated..or KISS.

Being as simpleton, I choose the KISS principle.

Cheers!

(In some fragile/high use areas, though, you do have to blue bag it. In heavily wooded areas such as the majority of the Appalachians, I don't bother)

[trouthunter]

If me stealth camping is destroying precious plant life, and should not be permitted, then what ever will we do with the millions of creatures both big and small that spend their entire lives walking around in the wilderness.

That is a very short sighted argument against those of us who leave the beaten path sometimes, and a great example of the kind of nonsense some special interest groups spew forth.
Me pitching a tent off trail does no more harm than a couple deer laying down for the night, mother nature has fabulous recuperative abilities.

[JAK]

I agree with trouthunter on that one also. There are some sensitive area we shouldn't tread, and others we shouldn't tread very often, so we simply need to go somewhere else. But there are some that think that all humans should live in cities and only travel through wilderness on gilded monorails. God help us if we every come to live like that, and God help nature.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dnLZjBnVm38

[JAK]

http://www.lasalle.edu/~didio/course...of_thunder.htm

He indicated a metal path that struck off into green wilderness, over streaming swamp, among giant ferns and palms.

"And that," he said, "is the Path, laid by Time Safari for your use,

It floats six inches above the earth. Doesn't touch so much as one grass blade, flower, or tree. It's an anti-gravity metal. Its purpose is to keep you from touching this world of the past in any way. Stay on the Path. Don't go off it. I repeat. Don't go off. For any reason! If you fall off, there's a penalty. And don't shoot any animal we don't okay."

"Why?" asked Eckels.

They sat in the ancient wilderness. Far birds' cries blew on a wind, and the smell of tar and an old salt sea, moist grasses, and flowers the color of blood.

"We don't want to change the Future. We don't belong here in the Past. The government doesn't like us here. We have to pay big graft to keep our franchise. A Time Machine is finicky business. Not knowing it, we might kill an important animal, a small bird, a roach, a flower even, thus destroying an important link in a growing species."


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wkLT57mVnGE
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kqd4Ol8FlGc
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-xuq3kOwGGw