How Little Trace Do You Leave Behind?

[Odd Man Out]

When reading about "Leave No Trace" principles, I have observed that "no trace" means different things to different people, depending on the circumstance and the individual's philosophy. For human waste, I have seen various recommendations, including pack out all waste, only solid waste, only toilet paper, or just bury it all so it can't be seen and will decay. Does LNT mean don't build campfires at all, or only in existing fire rings? For you, does LNT mean you can't swim (an leave behind traces of insect repellent and/or sunscreen in the pond)? If I broadcast my coffee grounds into the woods so that no one will ever see them, am I leaving a trace or not? Are my carbide tipped trekking poles leaving a trace (those rubber tips don't last too long). So given that it is almost impossible for even the strictest LNT advocate to really leave not trace behind, what degree of a trace is typical for a long-distance AT hiker?

[Manwich]

Leave no trace is a misnomer. Leave as little a trace as practically possible.

[ChinMusic]

Do your best so that others that follow you, aside from tracks, can't tell you were there.

This does not include CSI.

[JAK]

At beast, Leave No Trace is misguided. At worst, it is a scam to get people to continue to practice unsustainable hiking, and living. LNT as it is practiced is wrong, because it is only concerned with the impact of our lifestyles on the trail. LNT as it is practiced is wrong, because it continues to perpetuate the myth that the world of man is separate from the world of nature. We need to be concerned with the total impact of our choices, such as fuel cannisters, hiking sticks, food packaging, and more clothing and gear than we will ever wear out.

Sustainability should be our concern, not LNT.

[ChinMusic]

Sustainability should be our concern, not LNT.

Totally different issue.

[Appalachian Tater]

I see sustainability and LNT intertwined as well. In the Smokies or Lehigh Gap you see the devastation caused by pollution that is much worse than anything thoughtless hikers could do. I go to the beach and see all the garbage people leave behind at the end of the day but it's nothing compared to what washes up from the water or even the bacteria in the water from sewage overflow. The issues of the way we are destroying the planet on a grand scale are pretty hard to ignore if you think about them and are more important in my mind than how deep you bury #2 while hiking.

Also, as they say, LNT is a set of principles, not rules. I have no problem leaving fruit peels somewhere where they will decompose and no one will ever see them. I don't even have a problem with burning paper (only) in a fire pit--after all, paper is wood. I have taken a book or magazine out of a shelter and left it in a different one down the trail. Some people get upset about those things.

On the other hand, I don't put anything except the end of my water filter into a spring but have seen people treat them like bathtubs or beer coolers or dog washes. But would it really matter either way if the stream is in the watershed of a cattle farm?

Overall, there is more long-term danger in ignoring the big issues and focusing only on the small ones. Driving a vehicle that gets 12 mpg while being scrupulous about littering seems a little ridiculous in my mind.

[jesse]

Bury poop.
Carry out toilet paper.
Fires in existing fire rings only.
Swimming is fine.
Coffee grounds ok.
Carbon tip Treking poles?

[scottdennis]

I strive to make an impact that only a professional tracker could follow.

[GGS2]

Sustainability should be our concern, not LNT.

Totally different issue.

I'm with JAK on this one. It's not a different issue, just a different locale. We are in the midst of the world ecology, and whatever we do has an impact. LNT was spawned by the visible damage we do to our heavy use recreation areas with such innocuous activities as hiking and camping. If you study a bit of anthropology, you can find that even when we were rather few people, a few million as opposed to the 6+ billion we are now, we were making marks from trail walking, riding and driving that are readable even now thousand or hundreds of years later. And enviro science is learning to discern the traces of our activities in the polar ice, atmosphere and oceans, as well as on the land. The world we inhabit is the trace of continuous activity by living organisms, including mankind, for millions of years. The reason LNT seems a bit dated now is simply because we understand better that the attempt to limit it to trails and campgrounds is futile: Whatever we do, we leave our marks, and they all matter. We cannot simply stop leaving evidence of our existence, without leaving ourselves as well. The point now is that we must reduce our impact for undesirable change as much as we can in order not to change the world into a place we can't comfortably inhabit. We are the result of a world not unlike what we find around us today, minus the garbage and changes we have made through our cities, farms and industrial activities. If we change the world so that resemblance is no longer dominant, we will be in trouble, along with the plants and animals that co-evolved with us

[ChinMusic]

If you think that LNT has anything to do with reusing a McDonald's wrapper from lunch today, IMO, you are FOS.

[ChinMusic]

I strive to make an impact that only a professional tracker could follow.

bingo.....

or CSI

[The Will]

Sustainability and LNT.

It seems that they are both applications of the same principle and distinguished only by the specific definitions we have ascribed to them. Each deserves emphasis. Each could be improved upon. I can see LNT as a subheading beneath sustainability. I don't understand why LNT would have to be minimized for the other to receive greater attention.

[Appalachian Tater]

If you think that LNT has anything to do with reusing a McDonald's wrapper from lunch today, IMO, you are FOS.

Well, you pick an extreme example but the point is it's not enough to minimize impact at a campsite. There are so many humans it is necessary to minimize impact on the planet as a whole. Same principles apply either way. All those dead trees in the Smokies are pretty gut-wrenching to me, worse than a few wads of toilet paper here and there.

[Nuthatch]

Carry out toilet paper.

Why? Toilet paper is wood. Totally biodegradable.

[JustaTouron]

I see sustainability and LNT intertwined as well.

I see them as two totally different things. Using a petro based stove instead of a fire is LNT. Using a wood fire instead of petro is sustainable.

Also, as they say, LNT is a set of principles, not rules. I have no problem leaving fruit peels somewhere where they will decompose and no one will ever see them. I don't even have a problem with burning paper (only) in a fire pit--after all, paper is wood. I have taken a book or magazine out of a shelter and left it in a different one down the trail. Some people get upset about those things.

quoting you on that because you said exactly my thoughts and better than I could.

On the other hand, I don't put anything except the end of my water filter into a spring but have seen people treat them like bathtubs or beer coolers or dog washes. .

i agree with bubble bath and dog wash, what is wrong with using a stream as a beer cooler? The beer only stays in there for a little while and at worst you are adding what ever bit of dirt might be on the outside of the can. Not packing the empties out, I have a problem with using a stream to cool the beer before drinking it seems perfectly LNT.

[GGS2]

I strive to make an impact that only a professional tracker could follow.

bingo.....

or CSI

If you strive to do this on the AT or any other heavy use trail, you are, to coin a phrase, "FOS". Ordinary use of such a trail, meaning just the multiple foot falls, makes a trail that many have noted is hard to miss. Your professional tracker would have no difficulty following you, and countless others.

Now remember that the AT is heavily maintained. All that maintenance is an ecological impact. Then recall that the AT is used by all the local four-foots when we are not there, especially at night. They find the defined trail useful, and they reinforce our trail. In the North Country of Canada, most of the portage trails and overland routes follow game trails, mostly moose and other large ungulates. They were defined trails before the people came, and reinforced after.

It all interlocks, and we can't ignore our own impact. To me, the argument is not about slipping unnoticed off the trail to hang or pitch an overnight shelter. It's about all the "ordinary" impacts we have that we can't escape or avoid without ceasing our activities entirely.

[Appalachian Tater]

I see them as two totally different things. Using a petro based stove instead of a fire is LNT. Using a wood fire instead of petro is sustainable.

That sounds more like intertwined to me! Definitely some kind of relationship, even if you see it as inverse.

[ChinMusic]

If you strive to do this on the AT or any other heavy use trail, you are, to coin a phrase, "FOS". Ordinary use of such a trail, meaning just the multiple foot falls, makes a trail that many have noted is hard to miss. Your professional tracker would have no difficulty following you, and countless others.

Oh, I see. Hiking on a well marked/travelled trail by YOUR definition violates LNT.

What pap.........

[The Outsider]

If you read the principles of Leave No Trace on their website (http://www.lnt.org/programs/principles.php) you'll see they are actually quite well defined, I would be surprised if there are many that anyone would find very controversial. I don't see any conflict between sustainability and LNT ethics. These are suggested "best practices" and are intended to educate people about how they can minimize their impact on the backcountry environment, there are of course many things you can do to reduce your impact on the planet as a whole as well, which LNT is not intended to replace but expand on.

[scottdennis]

So I'm FOS for thinking that I can maneuver through an area without leaving a discernible clue that I was there? I'll have you know that 99.9% of wildlife leave more of a trace than me, particularly when I make a concerted effort to minimize my impact.