Changing the nature of using nature

There was a time - in my lifetime, actually - when anyone wanting wood to burn for the winter, all they had to do was drive just a few miles from town and cut a full season's supply - and it wasn't necessary to obtain a permit. But not anymore.

There was a time when anyone could hunt, fish, hike, peddle a bike, drive a motorcycle or snowmobile anywhere they wanted. Not anymore.

There was a time when anyone could hike the entire Cascade range without worrying about where to camp, where to build a fire - or whether he or she had a permit. You can't do that anymore either.

There was a time when there was no limit on the amount of ducks and geese you shot during hunting season or the numbers of fish you brought home to feed the family.

Dean Hollinshead, a Deschutes County pioneer, told me that when came to La Pine in 1910 - when it was known as Roselyn- his dad took him fishing with a case of dynamite at Pringle Falls.

Dean and his two brothers, Chet and Cecil, would wait at the bottom of the falls with dip nets, while their dad went to the upper end and began throwing sticks of dynamite into the water that exploded with a roar.

In moments, hundreds of dead Dolly Varden trout came floating by, and the Hollinshead boys scooped them out with their nets. In about a week, there were 20 or so barrels of salted trout put up that would get the family through the winter at the Hollinshead claim near Dorrence Meadow.

The only place you can see wild Dollies today is under the bridge at Camp Sherman.

The days of "no end to it all; it'll last forever" are gone. Our forests have been exploited for almost all the big trees. Dead trees that once supported abundant cavity-nesting birds and kept a lot of homes warm in winter are carefully managed so that some can be used for wildlife and others for firewood.

In the early 1900s, no one had the slightest inkling that passenger pigeons would some day be extinct. But when tons of pigeon meat was shipped to restaurants in New York and Philadelphia year-after-year, passenger pigeons vanished forever.

In the early 1900s the millinery trade convinced ladies that feathers in their hats would make them more attractive. The result was a mass killing of herons, egrets and other waterfowl that brought several of them to the brink of extinction.

In the '50s and '60s, you would have been hard-pressed to see a wild bald eagle or peregrine falcon soaring overhead. But not anymore. We have rebuilt their populations through habitat conservation and other management considerations.

Sure, it costs money now to hike the Cascade Crest; you have to purchase a permit. You also must purchase a woodcutting permit to harvest dead trees that keep us warm over winter. It's also illegal to place feathers of protected birds in your hat.

Conservation has taken the place of exploitation; management has taken the place of mismanagement of our natural resources.

There's a strict limit on what species of fish, waterfowl, upland game birds and game animals may be harvested - and how many you can take home during hunting season. And you can only hunt during the season, not any old time you want to.

You can not use explosives to harvest fish, either.

The answer to saving species boils down to three key factors: Habitat conservation; natural diversity; and species protection. Without a place to call home, a roof (of some kind) over everyone's heads, enough food to eat and a place where all can live in peace, our trying to save wildlife is a lost cause.

Yes, the passenger pigeon and (perhaps) ivory-billed woodpecker are gone, but we are working hard to save the snowy plover, spotted owl, American bald eagle, California condor - and man.

We're (hopefully) learning from our mistakes. We know what it takes to insure the safety of nesting eagles. We know what it's going to take to save what salmon we have left.

We also know that whatever we do won't be easy or inexpensive. And as we soar into a new century of conservation, there is one overwhelming fact we must keep uppermost in our agenda: "There ain't no such thing as a free lunch."