Posted on 02/05/2008 6:04:26 AM PST by Diana in Wisconsin
Fewer people are visiting national parks and taking part in outdoor activities such as camping, according to new research that suggests people are falling out of love with the natural world.
The study by US conservationists discovered an "ongoing and fundamental shift away from nature-based recreation" that they say could threaten future efforts to preserve wilderness areas. The experts say people now make up to 25% fewer trips than they did in the 1980s, and say the rise of computer games could be to blame.
Oliver Pergams, a biologist at the University of Illinois, and Patricia Zaradic of the US Environmental Leadership Programme, compared records of visits with dozens of national parks, state parks and other public land across the US, Japan and Spain. They also analysed US licence applications to hunt deer, fish and shoot ducks, as well as surveys on the popularity of outdoor pursuits such as camping and hiking.
They found that the popularity of almost all activities peaked in the 1980s and then went into sharp decline. This drop reverses the trend seen in the post-war decades, which saw a boom in their popularity. Only the number of day hikes has increased. The Spanish data did not show a clear trend, but were for a relatively short period. The study is published today in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
The researchers said: "All major lines of evidence point to a general and fundamental shift away from people's participation in nature-based recreation. The cultural shift away from nature recreation appears to extend outside of the US, to at least Japan, and the decline appears to have begun 1981-1991. The root cause may be videophilia [a preference for indoor media activities]."
(Excerpt) Read more at guardian.co.uk ...
Land grabbers annoy me to no end. And they’re 100% on the Global Warming Boondoggle Bandwagon, too.
There are 35 million acres in Wisconsin, alone. Less than 1 million of those acres are developed in any way...but that’s not good enough. They want more land preserved. No growth for communities, no jobs, no progress, etc. (It’s not just the NC, it’s many smaller EnviroWacko groups in WI and other states as well.)
Here’s their (NC) new ideas for making cash off of GW to grab more land “for the common good.”
Its turning conservation on its head, said Bill Stanley, who directs the global climate change initiative at the Nature Conservancy. He said the organization has a goal to protect 10 percent of major habitat types like grasslands, forests and freshwater systems by 2015.
We are not sure exactly how to treat this yet, Mr. Stanley said. Areas that we preserved as grasslands are going to become forests. Does this mean we are going to have to have more than enough forest and less grassland than we had before? Or does it mean we should fight it try to keep the forest from coming into those grasslands? Or should we try to find new areas that are least likely to change, that seem to be the least susceptible to change, and prioritize those areas?
As Dr. Hamilton put it, Our whole strategy is going to have to shift.
Sorry - you can’t shoot in a national park.
TR never saw that coming.
Great apes face threat from germs carried by eco-tourists
Eco-holidays raise vital funds for the protection of wildlife, but nature-lovers carry human viruses that have been proved fatal for animals
I am sure they have done that since attendance is down.
bump
Not me, I started Bow Hunting this past year and I'm addicted!
Can't wait for Turkey season!
Who in their right mind would hike from Newfound Gap to Charlies Bunion in the Smokies when you could spend the time walking the streets of Gatlinburgh or the malls of Pigeon Forge?
If you shoot a bear in the woods and nobody else hears the sound, did it really happen?
I don’t care about their position on global warming but they are NOT land grabbers. They don’t force anybody to give up land. It’s all voluntary. If I want my land to go into a trust and not be developed, why the heck should you care? Isn’t it my choice? Or do you believe I should be forced to commit my land to development?
....more stamina (ie I am older......
Ever hiked at Cumberland Island?
I’m working my old bones up for a trip there in May. It’s flat as a board..... no up! Miles and miles of trails.
Oh my God, what a relief. ANWAR is now safe from the hoardes of tourist who were flocking there to take in the pristine wilderness.
“Time to cut wages and lay off personnel.
I am sure they have done that since attendance is down.”
All national parks did that a long time ago. They’ve been understaffed (for the number of visitors) for years now.
Government is filled with people who tell you what you can't do. What else do you do with a hack but fill out an application for permission to do something. America needs an enema.
Why go to a park when I can just pop in my nature DVD and enjoy scenic vistas from the comfort of my sofa? I don’t have to worry about ticks, poison ivy, or rabid wildlife. I can even throw my empty chip bags on the floor!
On a related note, my mom has a senior pass to all national parks. Cost her $10. It allows her to go to the beach at the National Park on the Assateague Seashore here in Maryland. The Park Service recently got particularly strict about entry into the park by making everyone wait in the same line for park entry (they used to let the passholders go through a different gate). Apparently, people got onto the National Seashore without paying because of lax entry policies.
The moral of the story is...Mexicans can stream across the border with impunity, but my 63 year old mother gets the shakedown trying to get into a National Park she’s paid to use.
lol
That and they expect us to go out into the wild without firearms to protect ourselves.
More my view, but a lot of people can't see the point of the camp/hike with nature itself being the attraction. Yes viewing it on the larger and clearer home screens of today is a nice experience but nothing can compare to the early morning smells of a dew drenched semi-wilderness.
"Wilderness" areas really annoy me. No trail maintenance allowed, no blazes on the trees, no bicycles allowed. A tree falls across the trail and you can't even get out a chain saw and clear it out of the way. Like keeping up some nice trails and letting people enjoy them on bicycles is going to adversely affect anything. Oh, and they let horseback riding no problem. Have you ever compared the damage a horse does to a trail vs. a bicycle? (yeah, so maybe I like mountain biking)
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