Conserving Southern Longleaf

Cover

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Contents

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pp. ix-

List of Illustrations

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pp. xi-

Foreword

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pp. xiii-xvi

Anybody who has read widely in American environmental history has come across Herbert Stoddard’s name. Stoddard has made cameo appearances in some of the most important books in the field. In her pioneering study of Aldo Leopold’s evolving thought on predator-prey relations, Thinking like a Mountain, Susan Flader noted in passing that “unquestionably the most significant research in early game management was by Herbert L. Stoddard.” ...

Acknowledgments

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pp. xvii-xx

I started thinking about this book while conducting background reading for another project, an oral history with Herbert Stoddard’s protégé and friend Leon Neel. I began with Stoddard’s memoir, a wonderful reflection on a life well lived but not, I thought, quite the stuff of a dissertation. ...

Introduction

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pp. 1-18

Just outside of the city limits of Thomasville, Georgia, runs a public dirt road called Pine Tree Boulevard. It was once a perimeter road, but in recent years the city moved parts of it due to various zoning or planning schemes. There remains, however, one section about a mile in length that is surrounded by the most spectacular longleaf pine woodland one will ever see. ...

One. From Public Playground to Private Preserve

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pp. 19-55

John W. Masury, a wealthy paint manufacturer from New York, recounted his 1889 southern journey to Thomasville, Georgia, as nothing less than an ascent into the heavens. On the train ride from New York, “rain was the order all the way . . . until Thomasville was almost in sight. An hour before we reached our destination the clouds broke away and revealed the sun’s face...

Two. The Development of an Expert

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pp. 56-80

Herbert Stoddard’s journey south in early February 1924 must have been a little nostalgic. He had spent eight childhood years in the longleaf pine forests of central Florida, trapping a variety of mammals and reptiles, running with cattle herders, amassing a collection of wild pets, and generally running roughshod over the forest. ...

Three. Putting Fire in Its Place

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pp. 81-115

As he did most every day while visiting the Red Hills region of south Georgia and north Florida, Henry Beadel—the son of a northern industrialist—was quail hunting with his brother, Gerald, and their African American driver, Charley. It was a chilly afternoon in February, late 1890s. ...

Four. Stalking Wildlife Management

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pp. 116-142

Herbert Stoddard’s struggle with foresters over the use of fire demanded much of his attention before and after publishing The Bobwhite Quail, but his principal interest during these years was to carve out a niche for wildlife management as a professional field. He was much more interested in sorting out the complex interactions of wildlife, plant life, and human land...

Five. Wild Land in Cultivated Landscapes

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pp. 143-171

As Herbert Stoddard put the final touches on The Bobwhite Quail in early 1930 from his temporary home in Washington, D.C., several of his closest acquaintances busily concocted plans for his future. He already acted as the Biological Survey’s representative for the Sporting Arms and Ammunition Manufacturing Institute’s game fellowship program...

Six. From Wildlife Management to Ecological Forestry

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pp. 172-199

In late 1941 two very different storms came to bear on life in the Red Hills that would transform Herbert Stoddard’s daily work and legacy. One was the worldwide upheaval of World War II, which created a strong, lucrative market for timber; the other, more circumscribed and quite literally a storm, rotated up from the Gulf of Mexico, leaving substantial wind damage in its wake as it passed through the Red Hills. ...

Seven. Bringing Agrarian Science to the Public

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pp. 200-222

By the 1950s Herbert Stoddard had become something of a cult figure among American naturalists and scientists. Though less engaged in professional matters after World War II, he continued to host a steady stream of visitors of all stripes at Sherwood: academic biologists eager to see some of the finest remaining longleaf woodlands in the coastal plain...

Conclusion

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pp. 223-227

Herbert Stoddard died on November 15, 1970. Though almost too poetic to be true, he is said to have passed with a copy of Aldo Leopold’s A Sand County Almanac in his lap.¹ Apocryphal or not, it is appropriate to link their legacies together. Leopold did more than anyone during the interwar years to promote a new way of thinking about the American landscape...

Notes

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pp. 229-262

Bibliography

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pp. 263-288

Index

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pp. 289-300