It is painful to read these circumlocutions today. We have no land ethic
yet, but we have at least drawn nearer the point of admitting that birds
should continue as a matter of biotic right, regardless of the presence
or absence of economic advantage to us.

 * * *

A parallel situation exists in respect of predatory mammals, raptorial
birds, and fish-eating birds. Time was when biologists somewhat
overworked the evidence that these creatures preserve the health of game
by killing weaklings, or that they control rodents for the farmer, or
that they prey only on "worthless" species. Here again, the evidence had
to be economic in order to be valid. It is only in recent years that we
hear the more honest argument that predators are members of the
community, and that no special interest has the right to exterminate
them for the sake of a benefit, real or fancied for itself.
Unfortunately this enlightened view is still in the talk stage. On the
back forty the extermination of predators goes merrily on: witness the
impending erasure of the timber wolf by fiat of Congress, The
Conservation Bureaus, and many state legislatures.

 * * *

Some species of trees have been "read out of the party" by
economics-minded foresters because they grow too slowly, or have too low
a sale value to pay as timber crops: white cedar, tamarack, cypress,
beech, and hemlock are examples. In Europe, where forestry is
ecologically more advanced, the non-commercial tree species are
recognized as members of the native forest community, to be preserved as
such, within reason. Moreover some (like beech) have been found to have
a valuable function in building up soil fertility. The interdependence
of the forest and its constituent tree species, ground flora, and fauna
is taken for granted.

 * * *