[pct-l] Re: pct-l Digest, Vol 26, Issue 10

[jim at mccrain.net (Jim McCrain)]

Adrian,

Please do some reading on the topics of: Minimum Impact Camping, Leave No Trace, and basic back-country ethics and etiquette.  (To say NOTHING about NPS, NFS, and NWA rules and regulations!)  The practice of putting pine boughs and branches under your bed is definately NOT a good idea, either from an ecological or aesthetic standpoint.  Unless those branches naturally fell off the tree, then you had to have either pulled them off or cut them off.  This is NOT an acceptable practice.  If everyone did this, there would be no trees left!  Any Ranger that sees you destroying the foresxt in this manner can write you a citation, too.  It is strictly against all rules and regulations.

Now, if this was an emergency situation, and you needed to strip the trees in order to stay alive, then forget what I said.  But just getting a little runoff under your bed is NOT a life-threatening situation.

Sorry to sound a little brusque or angry, but PLEASE try to tread lightly in the wilderness.  If I am on the trail behind you, I don't want to know that you have allready been there, and I definately want to see the trees with all their branches on them!

Jim McCrain
A Concerned Hiker

*********** REPLY SEPARATOR  ***********

On 6/6/2005 at 11:32 AM  adrian.borner@ch.abb.com wrote:

>When it was very wet with run-offs I made myself a bed of pine tree 
>branches below the ground sheet. This kept me off the wet ground, was warm 
>and also softer.