Outdoor Ethics - Leave No Trace

[SowthEfrikan]

Hi, I'm new here, and it's already struck me that people are cheerfully chatting about building fires and leaving fire rings, cutting vegetation for shelters and bedding, and generally impacting their environment. Pretty much what I was used to from living in South Africa.

I then made a couple of seaches for Leave No Trace, and couldn't really find any discussion about it on the forums.

So ... do you know about this outdoor ethic/philosophy, and if so, what do you think about Leave No Trace?

For those who might not be familiar with it, visit

http://www.lnt.org/programs/lnt7/index.html

I was surprised the first time I was out with Americans who had trained in LNT. No campfire - what was the point of camping, I wondered? - and in the morning, the leaves were fluffed back up.

At first I thought it silly and a bit fanatical, but when I saw the difference it made to the environment (there really was just about no sign that people had ever passed that way) I was won over.

Is there something similar in Europe? And how is it taught?

[Martyn]

...try searching for "take only photographs, leave only footprints" or parts of it.

You should get more hits. :)

PS ...dont mention Landrovers. :D

[Freds Dad]

I once took a party of Scouts on a bushcraft camp in a wood by kind permission of the land owner. We lit fires skinned and gutted rabbits and did a hedgerow harvest. When the land owner came the next day to check us out he couldn't work out where the fires had been. Apart from strampled stingers ond bracken there was no sign of us being there. It is possible but needs a little work and thought.

[Matt Weir]

I know that whereever and however I camp I am a firm believer in LNT and I'm sure that I'm not the only one here that goes over their decamp with a fine tooth comb philosophy (esp with two kids and a dog & Missus - a potentially messy business I'm sure y'all will acknowledge).

Of course we all impact the environment to some degree, be it whilst practising bushcraft, going to work or even chilling in the back garden but I believe that you have come to a place where you dont need to search for a discussion on leaving no trace as it is generally assumed that anything contrary is simply not acceptable.

Matt.

[bogflogger]

Here in the UK, there is a basic set of Ethical Conduct rules for All users of the Countryside:

http://www.countrysideaccess.gov.uk/

This is often augmented by Codes of Practice for Mountain Leaders and Kayak/Canoe Instructors to work within.

Sadly, the "Leave No Trace" Philosophy is much more prevalent among Backpackers, Mountaineers and Paddlers, then it is in Bushcraft circles (mainly because there is no central organisational body) although this is slowly changing for the better.

[Neil1]

My outdoor life has been goverened by this ethic for a long time, I go to great lengths to ensure I leave no trace.
My fires are built on existing fire scars or are built on rafts, that can be cleared away and do not scorch the ground.
I never cut greenwood , only dead standing would that can be pushed over if it has not already fallen.
I keep my gear light and alternate my areas so that no one area becomes de-nuded.
My gear is chosen with the same ethic, recycling where I can and using gear until it is no longer useable.
I'm sure many here do the same.
Neil

[Zodiak]

Hello,

Yes that ethic is very much alive in this Country and as a Scout Leader it is something I try to teach them. Sadly many just don't understand.

A few weeks ago we were on an expedition and one of the lads asked if he could build a fire, I agreed so long as he kept to the designated areas which he did but in the process almost emptied the site wood pile with a hugley oversized fire. When I told him to take some back he wasn't at all happy so I asked what would the next person do if there was no wood, and he replied that was their problem. :eek:

With that sort of attitude its going to be hard to get them to understand.

Before leaving any site we carry out a complete litter sweep and make sure that all fires are out, the ashes are scattered thoughtfully or taken home and when using branches or nettles we follow the rule of never taking from sparse vegtation and never more than every 10th stem from elsewhere.

Sadly many adults and children see to think that they have to build the largest fire imaginable and keep it burning all camp. Why? Such a waste of resources, why can't they see that? :confused:

[fred gordon]

I think LNT camping is the only way. Not only for the environments sake however. The more of us who practice this the more likely we are to be accepted in the countryside and the easier it will be to get permission to camp etc.

[ilan]

Think this is a core part of bushcraft , There is nothing worse than finding a realy nice spot only to find the remains of a fire often full of burnt tins etc . I do agree tho there is a lot of talk about building shelters etc but in reality only dead wood and soft green materials/dead stuff are used in the uk . most people prefer the convenience of a rope and basha .Most of our open space is very controlled :) .

[pierre girard]

Hello,

Yes that ethic is very much alive in this Country and as a Scout Leader it is something I try to teach them. Sadly many just don't understand.

A few weeks ago we were on an expedition and one of the lads asked if he could build a fire, I agreed so long as he kept to the designated areas which he did but in the process almost emptied the site wood pile with a hugley oversized fire. When I told him to take some back he wasn't at all happy so I asked what would the next person do if there was no wood, and he replied that was their problem. :eek:

With that sort of attitude its going to be hard to get them to understand.

Before leaving any site we carry out a complete litter sweep and make sure that all fires are out, the ashes are scattered thoughtfully or taken home and when using branches or nettles we follow the rule of never taking from sparse vegtation and never more than every 10th stem from elsewhere.

Sadly many adults and children see to think that they have to build the largest fire imaginable and keep it burning all camp. Why? Such a waste of resources, why can't they see that? :confused:

Glad to see this attitude among scouts.

When I first started canoe guiding, in the 1960s, some scout groups were among the least likely to "leave no trace." It was never too hard to tell when certain scout groups had been on a campsite. They always tried to "improve" the campsite. You would see little tables or cots built of saplings and twine (most of which wouldn't stand upright), walk ways lined with rocks - sometimes spray-painted white (who brings along a can of spray paint on a canoe trip?), the duff all swept off the walkways with little brooms made of a sapling and pine needles (inducing erosion), and every one of the scouts had a little knife or a little hachet which he felt obliged to try out on the trees around the campsite.

Happily, this "improvement" ethic seems to have died out among scouts and I haven't seen such a campsite in many years.

As to campfires - the best campfires I've seen were built by Ojibwe - and also one Zulu man I went to college with. A few twigs, closely tended, were all he needed to cook his food.

[Nigel]

Leave No Trace? I have to admit I can’t say I fully practice this, fire yes always cleared away. Once you have found somewhere you feel comfortable with, you will inevitable use that site more and more, thus you will soon have an impact. If you where to visit a site that I have been using for many years you will soon see traces of human activity, but only if you really know what to look for. The most obvious is the rope I have hung up for my parachute, which has been left in situ, for convenience. I do however practise a good deal of low impact bushcrafting followed with conservation. In fact I could say that since I have been using the same area for such a long time I have seen more wildlife move in closer to the site I use, I have created habitat piles with left over wood to encourage insects, mammals etc, felled trees to open up the forest floor to encourage plants to thrive, coppiced hazel, willow to increase the growth of sparse shrubs, etc. All this has been done over several years and very subtly done.
To gain some sort of respect or trust from the land owners, you should also show them that you do respect there land, by clearing the damage left by those who do not, and then in return you will get the permission you want.

Nigel

[stovie]

So ... do you know about this outdoor ethic/philosophy, and if so, what do you think about Leave No Trace??

Take a look at the last photo in this THREAD (http://www.bushcraftuk.com/community/showthread.php?t=12705&highlight=scouts+balcombes) . Yes i practice what I preach to the best of my ability :D

[SowthEfrikan]

Stovie, that link you posted was just great - you clearly have way too much fun. That's the way things used to be when I was growing up. :-)

[mjk3k]

i allways go by LNT, best way i love seening a camp site as i found it, just makes you think nature looked after you for the night, your safe you should look after it and repay it even if it is clearing up a campfire and putting some leaves back...

my 2 cents

[Brian]

Hi,
I try to leave as little sign as possible when I'm out as I don't want to spoil an area for myself or anyone else. I don't like going to a new area and finding fire debris or other rubbish, I always feel the need to tidy it up :rolleyes:

Brian

[Harmonica]

As to campfires - the best campfires I've seen were built by Ojibwe - and also one Zulu man I went to college with. A few twigs, closely tended, were all he needed to cook his food.

An old American saying i once heard "An indian builds a small fire and huddles close to it, a white man builds a fire so large he has to stand well back."

[bloodline]

We try not to leave any trace and most of us know what we are doing and we really care for our countryside. By the way where is texas? :lmao: :lmao: :lmao: :lmao:

[Big Geordie]

I used to think I practised LNT, years of camping, TA etc.. But I've just qualified as an instructor of LNT in Nevada. The course was run by Bureau of Land Management (us Govt.)
It was fascinating in the way you adopt to conditionseg: is this a pristine site or a regularly used site? Where do I put my feet is as important as where do I put my fire.
If you want some booklets on this I may be able to obtain some before I return UK.
Just PM me and I'll see what I can do.
George

[wingstoo]

,Hi Folks

We have a great farmer who lets us use his land, he wants us to leave trace as he gets a grant for allowing access to his land...If we left no trace he gets no grant...He is very happy that we use what is redundant land to educate people both young and old...However when on other sites it is good to see as little trace as possible...

LS

[Feral]

I have become a firm beliver in this, a few yaers ago I went away with a few mates ( so-called), they only went away to get pissed away from their other halfs, when they left the campsite, they left all their empty cans and three sleeping bags ( because they puked on them), I was discusted with them, and vowed never to camping with them again. The bonus is I got three near brand (because for the puke, they never slept in them) new spleeping bags out of it.

[frogfish]

Hi!

I think one of the main question is: Do I some harm?

That is in my opinion correlated to the quantity of people using a spicific area and the time it takes to regrowt. And of course which plant I use, how spread is this particular plant here?

It is a big difference if I cut down a small tree, light a warm fire and get a bunch of green branches for my bed in the middle of the lappland wilderness where there probably will be no other hiker in the next few months or if I´m doing the same thing on the main trail in one of the crowded nationalparks in the USA or New Zealand which sees mayby hundred hikers a day...

Once more, if I´m felling a small pine-tree among thousends of pine trees in an area where the next road i several kilometers away and where I´m the only human beeing I think I do no harm, but...

...I´m feeling beeing part of nature, able to use the provided recourses. Not an astronaut taking all what he needs with him because he´s in an hostile environment.

Being part, not a stranger.

cheers, Heiko

[crazydave]

if you want lnt then you should try doing close observation training - what goes in comes out even the digested stuff :eek:

scouts aren't the worst but like most kids they have no respect for the enviroment - you should try doing d of e with the chavs. they also lack imagination so they tend to exhaust the nearest resource. story of mankind really.

I dont tend to light fires if I can help it - as long as I know how to is the main thing. I just enjoy the woods to try not to upset anyone when living in the trees.

as to woodpire saga - the old indian saying of 'red man make small fire keep warm, white man make large fire keep warm collecting wood' springs to mind

[black_kissa]

One good way to practice leave no trace is to choose one place as your core area, and try to learn everything you can there. Map it, find where the deer live, where the voles are, where the fox... Learn the trees, the birds, the plants. Map it, enjoy it, learn from it, love it.

The longer you go there, the more you become part of it and it becomes part of you. And LNT will come naturally, because if you litter the place, you'll come across it next time and see what effects it has on the environment.

Traveling far and wide to ever new places is an easy way not to see your own tracks :-)

Live and Love,
Anneke

[dommyracer]

I think LNT sometimes gets taken a bit far, and I can think of nothing worse than going on a course telling me "how to do it".

I see nothing wrong with using natural resources, in a responsible way.

You would be hard pressed to find evidence of any fire I have had, or any green wood that I cut.

[boisdevie]

Leave no trace is fine as an idea but surely it really depends on how busy the area is. If one person visits a wooded area of say 1 hectare in the course of a year and they have one fire and cut wood for shelter and heat then at the end of that year it would be hard to see that they had ever been there.
But if 20 people do the same thing every week then it's a different story.

[dwardo]

I do like the idea of LNT but i think like a lot of other extreme forms of outdoors/survival stuff it ends up more about avoiding stepping on bugs than enjoying the outdoors. I would not cut down anything green but some times it is needed for cooking sticks etc. I would try to avoid a natural bedding in well used areas as its just as easy to take a roll mat etc. I never leave trace of a fire but if you started digging around you may find a small black mark under some earth and leaves :rolleyes:

I see it as something to work towards but some people seem to need to take things to extremes and thats cool also i guess. Just be sensible and think of not just the next person but every person that may visit that site and its sustainability.

I like to cal this kind of more extreme stuff the "nettle undies" side of things :o

[John Fenna]

If I eat the local vegetation, roots, leaves, seeds etc am I not leaving trace by not allowing these items to flourish?
I think it is al la matter of degree - no one likes to find an obvious fire pit full of cans but I for one would love to find a clean fire pit with wood left by the previous users hung in the trees around ready for the next fire. leaving an obvious, but clean, fire area avoids multiple fire sites cooking multipul root systems in one area.
In well used areas minimizing damage, while using resources, be it fallen timber (insect habitat/firewood) green wood (new trees/coppicedbuilding resource) plant food (new plants/food) water (hydration for plants/drinking water) is always a balancing act. Do not trash an area of natural beauty but the best way to avoid damaging an area is to stay in the concrete jungle - and I for one will not do that!
John

[Ogri the trog]

I must admit to having some reservation about the LNT ethics. Cooking on a meths/parafin/hexy etc burner is implying that there is a massive hole in the ground somewhere, with the petro-chemical industry leaving big trace on your behalf. I think I side with John Fenna here, burn local fallen wood without denuding the local area. Eat forraged foods without destroying every plant and gather materials for your projects whilst not preventing the next visitor from doing the same thing. Man has been using the wilderness for millenia, I don't see sufficient reason to stop using it, wisely - either now or in the future.

Ogri the trog

[addyb]

For me, I try to leave a campsite in exactly the same condition as it was when I got there. And that may mean doing a lot of cleanup. But in the end, it's worth it because I know the next person will enjoy it just as much as I did.

Adam

[dommyracer]

If I eat the local vegetation, roots, leaves, seeds etc am I not leaving trace by not allowing these items to flourish?
I think it is al la matter of degree - no one likes to find an obvious fire pit full of cans but I for one would love to find a clean fire pit with wood left by the previous users hung in the trees around ready for the next fire. leaving an obvious, but clean, fire area avoids multiple fire sites cooking multipul root systems in one area.
In well used areas minimizing damage, while using resources, be it fallen timber (insect habitat/firewood) green wood (new trees/coppicedbuilding resource) plant food (new plants/food) water (hydration for plants/drinking water) is always a balancing act. Do not trash an area of natural beauty but the best way to avoid damaging an area is to stay in the concrete jungle - and I for one will not do that!
John

Very good points. I understand in Scandinavia for example it is more common to find established fire sites?

[Rod]

One good way to practice leave no trace is to choose one place as your core area, and try to learn everything you can there. Map it, find where the deer live, where the voles are, where the fox... Learn the trees, the birds, the plants. Map it, enjoy it, learn from it, love it.

The longer you go there, the more you become part of it and it becomes part of you. And LNT will come naturally, because if you litter the place, you'll come across it next time and see what effects it has on the environment.

Traveling far and wide to ever new places is an easy way not to see your own tracks :-)

Live and Love,
Anneke

totally agree with you on this Anneke :headbang:

[gregorach]

It's pretty common in Scotland too...

[Edit] Finding established fire circles, that is.