Round River: From the Journals of Aldo Leopold (Galaxy Book, 372)

Rating:
Summary: "Sand County Almanac" is a better combination of essays
Review: I tend to throw all the naturalists/conservationists/environmentalists into one big group and think of them in similar terms. I temporarily forgot that Aldo Leopold came to the field with a hunting background. And even though he writes about being forever affected by the regretable dying fire in a she-wolf's eyes in _Sand County Almanac_, none of that feeling is conveyed here. There's a lot of hunting in this book. A lot. Part II is one camping trip after another, with a fair amount of innocent animals providing food along the way. If you're like me and would rather not witness the carnage, read just four or five of the selections: "A Man's Leisure Time," "Country," "Natural History," and all of Part III. You probably won't miss anything crucial by doing so, and you'll get the gist of Aldo Leopold's ideas about conservation and the land ethic. His philosophic musings make for worthwhile reading. It's too bad more of them don't appear here.

Rating:
Summary: The Heart of Aldo Leopold
Review: Leopold's essay, "Goose Music" is a classic must read. Too bad this chapter was left out of the anniversary edition of Leopold's Sand County Almanac.