We’re fortunate to have Adirondack Wilderness nearby. But what does Wilderness with a capital “W” mean? We commonly talk about wild land as “wilderness” but often forget that Wilderness has a legal definition with specific protections.

The Forest Preserve in New York state is defined as “forever wild” in the state Constitution. This means the forests owned by the state within the Adirondack Park (and Catskill Park) cannot be cut or destroyed by anyone, public or private, without a lengthy legal process involving multiple years of voting by the people of the state. This was a radical idea for the 19th century that inspired Adirondack conservationist Bob Marshall to push for “forever wild” lands at the national level in the 1930s, a drive that culminated in the creation of the Wilderness Society in 1935 and passage of the federal Wilderness Act in 1964.

Marshall and others advocated for Wilderness as a place where natural processes dominated, “untrammeled” by those who would use mechanized or motorized equipment. People like Bob Marshall and Aldo Leopold saw wild land as essential for ecological and spiritual reasons. The Wilderness Act gives federal protection to these specially designated lands. Bicycles, chainsaws, and helicopters are restricted. Traditional uses like hunting, fishing and travel by foot and horseback are allowed.

New York state has adopted Wilderness restrictions on the wildest parts of the Forest Preserve, while leaving some “Wild Forest” areas accessible to motorized equipment but still not to be cut. (Interestingly, federal Wilderness is vulnerable to the whims of Congress, whereas New York State Wilderness and Wild Forest is more firmly protected by the state Constitution.) Unfortunately, the idea of Wilderness is still misunderstood by many. Every Wilderness Area in the country seems to have issues of encroaching development and motorized intrusion. We need to recognize that Wilderness is a small subset of public lands with deep value and important restrictions.

Though I grew up at the northwest edge of the Adirondack Park and taught high school science at Canton for my career, I’ve worked on fires and fire lookouts at the edge of Idaho’s Selway-Bitterroot Wilderness in the summer for decades. Last September, I attended the opening day of a gathering organized by Wilderness Watch, a watchdog group dedicated to preventing abuses of Wilderness and advocating for its protection.

Members of Idaho’s Nez Perce Tribe (or Nimiipuu, “the people”) joined the gathering. Much of the federal Selway-Bitterroot Wilderness was part of their original treaty land (similarly, much of the Adirondacks was originally Haudenosaunee — formerly “Iroquois” — land). Indigenous voices are joining others to advocate for protection of Wilderness and are asserting “rights of nature” worldwide.

This movement to give nature rights has the potential to fundamentally change our relationship to mountains, rivers and wildlife. Imagine a world where rivers and trees have rights similar to private interests and corporations. This may be the next step in the evolution of Wilderness, allowing protection for nature, including trees and flowing water.

Wilderness is still a challenge to understand and educate others about. Those of us in and around the Adirondacks have a responsibility to understand the value of Wilderness and advocate for it. Wilderness is more than a convenient recreation area or natural area for our benefit. It is more than a critical carbon sink for buffering climate change and more than a source of ecological diversity.

Most of our Adirondack rivers originate in Wilderness Areas. These rivers and their creatures have a right to exist. Their survival is connected to ours. When we enter a Wilderness Area, we should recognize that we are entering an area dedicated not to us, but to natural processes and the beings living there (and a long history of indigenous use).

After the Wilderness gathering in Idaho, I walked with a couple friends to Grave Peak, where Bob Marshall was once treed by a grizzly bear. His brush with death thrilled him. Marshall saw Wilderness as a place to enter with care and consideration, knowing death or injury is possible. When people enter Wilderness, they need to remember the words from the Wilderness Act defining it (in 1964 terms) as “an area where the earth and its community of life are untrammeled by man, where man himself is a visitor who does not remain.”

On a clear day, from the top of snowy Cat Mountain in the Five Ponds Wilderness, the view of Adirondack Wilderness is expansive. We are incredibly fortunate to have these uniquely defined lands nearby. They may give us the buffer we need to survive challenges in the coming years.

——

Tom Van de Water is a retired earth science teacher at Canton High School and lives in Colton at the northwestern edge of the Adirondacks. His summer work is as a fire lookout for the U.S. Forest Service in Idaho.