Page 14 - Black Range Naturalist Oct 2020

we will someday have to test them via scientific methodology. But ideas must come from a place of freedom, not constraint of academic discipline. Rather than be coldly objective in observing behavior of other species, we must relate to them, placing ourselves in their shoes (or tracks, as it were). Because we cannot experience their level of consciousness, we can only guess what they are thinking. When times are good, certainly most wild species have many empty hours to rest. Their minds must not be empty at these times. I've observed evidence of planning and strategizing by my various dogs, guided by memory. And in the case of wild prey species, no doubt, memories lead to fear. Do they mull over their own close calls or observed deaths of peers? Certainly they must accumulate knowledge and experience at some level, and this affects their future behavior.
So how do we describe the complexities of habitat, and its importance, to non-biologists (and biologists who haven't thought it through, for that matter)? Perhaps William deBuys expresses it best in The Walk as he envisions the forest from which his pine desk was derived: "It would have been a forest that harbored uncountable creatures from bacteria to bears, a biota always in tension, always dynamic, a living community of interrelations more complex than the most brilliant among us has the power to conceive."
That said, perhaps we should stop the discourse here and simply acknowledge that nature, in its largest sense, is too complicated for us to understand. In fact, we might conclude that most of human effort over time has been aimed at defeating complexity — eliminating those elements we don't understand and can't control. Some of us believe that nature resists these efforts — slowly, insidiously — and that humans will eventually lose. Whether the loss will involve returning earth to the lifeless orb it once was, or if humans will simply be suppressed by their own modification of the biosphere, making it unlivable for us, remains to be seen. My generation probably won't have to deal with the situation, but some future generation may well hate us for our lack of consideration. I would guess that we will not be seen as heroes to our progeny.
But back to complexity of habitat. Morrison, Marcot, and Mannon begin their book Wildlife-Habitat Relationships with the simple statement: "An animal's habitat is, in the most general sense, the place where it lives." These writers attempt to define habitat as: ". . . an area with the combination of resources (like food, cover, water) and
environmental conditions (temperature, precipitation, presence or absence of predators and competitors) that promotes occupancy by individuals of a given species (or population) and allows those individuals to survive and reproduce." This is a far cry from Leopold's original simplistic discussion of the need for "food, cover, water, and suitable juxtaposition" or Grange's discussion of land and vegetation. Essentially this updated definition includes everything in the surroundings other than the species (or population) being considered — everything in the surroundings of an individual. This includes conspecifics, either as mates, competitors, or social support. It might also expand the concept to include all evolutionary forces that brought the various components into focus at a particular
13