When
Aldo Leopold came to Madison in 1924 to serve as Associate Director
of the Forest Products Laboratory, he was a forester. The Forest
Products Laboratory, located on the western edge of University
of Wisconsin-Madison (UW) Campus, overlooked a pastoral landscape.
During his time in Madison, Leopold became an ecologist and did
his most important work including writing his posthumously published A
Sand County Almanac .
As the first Chair of Game Management (subsequently called Wildlife
Management and then Wildlife Ecology) in the United States, at
the UW-Madison (1933-1948) Aldo Leopold established this field
as an academic discipline, wrote the seminal text book Game
Management (published in 1933 before his appointment), and
developed a field research program. Leopold and his students used
both the Arboretum and the University Farm including adjoining
private lands (parts of which became the CNA).
Aldo Leopold also played a key role in the development of the
Arboretum, serving on the Arboretum Committee as the animal research
director. He served as spokesman for the Arboretum, articulating
the mission of the Arboretum as a re-creation of original Wisconsin
communities, promoted wildlife research at the Arboretum, and helped
restore the Arboretum. Not surprisingly, he also became involved
in the management and preservation of the lands of the West Campus.
Research in the University Farm
Leopold and his students studied Ring-necked Pheasants, Bobwhite,
and other species at the University Farm by University Bay and
other sites. He believed that scientific field research was an
essential part of wildlife management and required his students
to do field research in order to obtain a degree. Professor Leopold
and his students were the first to study the introduced Ring-necked
Pheasant in the United States . UW officials asked Leopold to help
them control the serious damage to the University Farm corn fields
caused by an estimated 300 pheasants. From 1934 through his death
he and his students monitored (using winter drives or feeder counts)
and studied these pheasants. In the hayfields at the University
Farm, there were 2 nests per acre and 57% of nests were destroyed
by a June 1936 mowing. After noting the other wildlife killed,
Leopold says that “the trail of the mowing Juggernaut is a gruesome
one” (Leopold, “1936 Pheasant Nesting Study,” The Wilson Bulletin ,
1937). Today we know that early hayfield mowing kills many grassland
bird species and is one factor causing a decrease in grassland
bird populations.
During the winters of 1936, 1937, and 1938, about 250 pheasants
were removed from the Bay area by trapping or shooting. In 1937,
129 of the estimated 220 pheasants were trapped and transplanted
to other sites. By feather marking the birds (gluing colored feathers
on the tail), the researchers were able to determine that when transported
to good habitat (food and shelter), the pheasants often survived
and stayed in the new area. The researchers concluded that transplanting
wild pheasants “may be cheaper and better than” releasing cage reared
birds (Leopold et al ., “Wisconsin Pheasant Movement Study,
1936-1937,” J of Wildlife Management, 1938, pp 3-12).
In addition, Leopold convinced the local landowners to protect surviving
foxes, so that they might control pheasant and rodent populations.
This was a progressive step in an era of predator extermination.
Protection of University Bay
In 1940 Aldo Leopold protested the idea of dredging
and filling University Bay to make a yachting club and harbor, calling
the university marsh “the sole bit of natural landscape remaining
on the campus” (Leopold, Letter to A. M. Brayton, Aug. 31, 1940)
and adding that the UW needed to set a good example in order to encourage
farmers to preserve marshes. In 1941 the UW acquired the greater
Picnic Point property, protecting the area from development (See
T. Brock's Spring 2004 article).
After testifying about the danger of shooting near a campus dormitory
and the bad moral effect of hunting in a refuge, in 1944 Leopold
convinced the Conservation Department to extend the University Bay
Refuge to include the Bay. This stopped shooting from the sandbar,
ending hunting in the area.
Recommendations on Picnic Point Management
Professor Leopold played a key role in the University Bay Committee,
which, shortly after Picnic Point was acquired, set the agenda for
the Picnic Point and the nearby natural areas for years. In the spring
of 1944 the Committee was appointed to “‘deal with the possibility
of declaring Lake Mendota a wildlife sanctuary and with other similar
or like biological problems'” (McCabe, R., A Niche in Time, unpub.
ms .). The Committee, made up of members of the Arboretum Committee,
James Dickson, Norman Fassett, Arthur Hasler, Aldo Leopold, and William
Longenecker, produced two papers suggesting possible educational
uses. Professor Hasler's “Teaching Exhibits Which Should be Installed
in the University Bay Area” * recommended setting up five teaching
exhibits: plant succession, rodent pressure, shade tolerance, erosion,
vegetation understory, and a red cedar plantation (Hasler, 1944).
Professor Leopold's “Wildlife in the Picnic Point Program”* suggested
that the area had readily observable wildlife which could be used
for education: birds (owls, spring waterfowl, and pheasants) and
mammals (foxes, rabbit damage, muskrat and mink). It noted the necessity
of preserving the marshes and woodlots and solving problems including
the pollution of Willow Creek and the plantation of exotic trees
and shrubs (Leopold, 1944).
The University Bay Committee's “Preliminary Detailed
Development Program for Picnic Point - University Bay Preserve”* recommended
that this property should be developed “as a recreation and aesthetic
area, as an outdoor laboratory for teaching, demonstration and research,
and as a museum of natural history and early agriculture of the state” (University
Bay Committee, May 1944). They suggested minimizing buildings, roads,
and automobile traffic, removing exotic trees and shrubs, and conducting
restoration or “the careful planning and development of
natural plant associations” (Ibid.). In addition, they urged
the “maintenance of University Bay and adjacent shores in a natural
state” (Ibid.) for a biological station. The
final report * summarizes the importance of this area:
The area is of outstanding value because of its natural beauty,
its diverse plant and animal life, and because it is within walking
distance of campus, and hence can be quickly reached by students
and by classes....The proposed preserve is similar in concept
to the University Arboretum, and might well be administered by
the Arboretum Committee (University Bay Committee, “The Development of Picnic Point
- University Bay Preserve,”June 1944).
Finally, it recommended the acquisition of Second Point, now Frautschi
Point.
In June 1944 the Arboretum Committee agreed to supervise the new
Picnic Point property, allowing the foresighted members of the University
Bay Committee, including Aldo Leopold, to oversee the development
of this special area.
Leopold's Death
Aldo Leopold died unexpectedly in 1948, leaving his students to continue
his projects.
* These early documents are available on the FCNA Web Site's
Area
History section).
I am indebted to Richard McCabe for his collection of the University
Bay Project materials (available in Steenbock Memorial Library Archives)
and his unpublished book, A Niche
in Time.
Do you have other stories of Aldo Leopold in the CNA?
Please share them with our readers, by sending them to rlenehan@charter.net or
mailing them to the FCNA.
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