Quotes & Sayings About Environmental Conservation

Conservation is a cause that has no end. There is no point at which we will say our work is finished. — Rachel Carson

Everyone ought to plant a tree in their lifetime. — Lailah Gifty Akita

How to pry the tourists out of their automobiles, out of their back-breaking upholstered mechanized wheelchairs and onto their feet, onto the strange warmth and solidity of Mother Earth again? This is the problem which the Park Service should confront directly, not evasively, and which it cannot resolve by simply submitting and conforming to the automobile habit. — Edward Abbey

Most of what I know about environmental conservation I learned from my father, who has been a leader within the movement for over 30 years. — Edward Norton

What obligation is more binding than to protect the cherished, to defend whoever or whatever cannot defend itself, and to nurture in turn that which has given nourishment? I'm reminded of words written by John Seed, an Australian environmentalist. When he began considering these questions, he believed, "I am protecting the rain forest." But as his thought evolved, he realized, "I am part of the rain forest protecting myself. — Richard Nelson

So you know that all living things share the same energy source and that every action that humans do to nature will affect everything on this planet. — Alison Cooklin

Perhaps the problem is not that we didn't work well enough together, but that we worked to well. In fact, maybe if we hadn't worked so well together, we wouldn't be destroying the earth so rapidly. — Steve Van Matre

To grow a sanctuary from seedlings takes time. But time has a way of going faster than you realize, and before you're aware of it you'll be rewarded hundredfold for your efforts. — David Kline

All I really want is for our world to become increasingly more beautiful. — Fennel Hudson

Plant a tree in your lifetime. — Lailah Gifty Akita

I am no ecological Pollyana. I have borne, and will continue to bear, feelings of wholehearted melancholy over the ecological state of the earth. How could I not? How could anyone not? But I am unwilling to become a hand-wringing nihilist, as some environmental 'realists' seem to believe is the more mature posture. Instead, I choose to dwell, as Emily Dickinson famously suggested, in possibility, where we cannot predict what will happen but we make space for it, whatever it is, and realize that our participation has value. This is grown-up optimism, where our bondedness with the rest of creation, a sense of profound interaction, and a belief in our shared ingenuity give meaning to our lives and actions on behalf of the more-than-human world. — Lyanda Lynn Haupt

I don't need any more press. I get enough when I work, but environmental causes is one place where you can get me to open my mouth. And put my foot in it if necessary. I think the only thing I do that gives me any bragging rights in terms of energy conservation is sailing. Just using wind power. — Morgan Freeman

In the 1940s and 1950s, the study of natural history
an intimate science predicated on the time-consuming collection and naming of life-forms
gave way to microbiology, theoretical and commercial. Much the same thing happened to the conservation movement, which shifted from local preservationists with soil on their shoes to environmental lawyers in Washington, D.C. — Richard Louv

Every man ought to plant a tree. — Lailah Gifty Akita

With ceremony, with forms of politeness and reassurance, they borrowed the waters of the River and its little confluents to drink and be clean and irrigate with, using water mindfully, carefully. They lived in a land that answers greed with drought and death. A difficult land: aloof yet sensitive. — Ursula K. Le Guin

I am passionate about exploring the confluence of environmental and human health. I believe that the goals of conservation must constantly revisit a stated purpose. — Barton Seaver

Environment isn't asking us to conserve her for her but for our future generations. — Mohith Agadi

Save the earth! Are you kidding?
If earth needs to save itself, we don't live now boasting about it. — Toba Beta

I travel all over the country speaking to young people, and I am always amazed at how engaged in environmental conservation they are. — Philippe Cousteau Jr.

The most important environmental issue is one that is rarely mentioned, and that is the lack of a conservation ethic in our culture. — Gaylord Nelson

Throughout my life, I have never stopped to strategize about my next steps. I often just keep walking along, through whichever door opens. I have been on a journey and this journey has never stopped. When the journey is acknowledged and sustained by those I work with, they are a source of inspiration, energy and encouragement. They are the reasons I kept walking, and will keep walking, as long as my knees hold out. — Wangari Maathai

Musicians have made incredible contributions to the conservation and environmental movement and continue to do so, more than ever. — Paul Watson

One of the challenges of educating especially poor people of any color on conservation and environmental issues is that poor people have a list of priorities that are more immediate quality of life issues. — Jerome Ringo

Corporate Responsibility; Environmental Preservation; Consumer Protection; Sex & Race Discrimination (they must mean Sex and Race Liberation). — John Cage

More and more, paddling the Yellowstone feels like that bedside visit, like we are attending to a friend in dire straits, a friend whom we have seen in the full bloom of health, but with whom, now, there is little to say and only our companionship to offer. — Alan S. Kesselheim

Nothing can ever fix nature' not even all monies in the world and money rules, are never worthy following. — Auliq Ice

A tree has roots in the soil yet reaches to the sky. It tells us that in order to aspire we need to be grounded and that no matter how high we go it is from our roots that we draw sustenance. It is a reminder to all of us who have had success that we cannot forget where we came from. It signifies that no matter how powerful we become in government or how many awards we receive, our power and strength and our ability to reach our goals depend on the people, those whose work remain unseen, who are the soil out of which we grow, the shoulders on which we stand — Wangari Maathai

Somebody has to be tireless or the fast buck operators would asphalt the entire coast, fill every bay and slay every living thing incapable of carrying a wallet. — John D. MacDonald

The love for God is the love to protect the environment. — Lailah Gifty Akita

Every intelligent man saw the poverty that would follow the destruction of the beaver, but there were no chiefs to control it; all was perfect liberty and equality. — David Thompson

Extinction, the irrevocable loss of a species, causes pain that can never find relief. It is an ache that will pass from generation to generation for the rest of human history. — Callum Roberts

It is unfortunate that some in our party have lost sight of the importance of conservation and environmental protection for keeping America strong, healthy, prosperous, and secure. It's time for all of our Republican leaders to recognize that conservation is conservative. — David Jenkins

Energy conservation is the foundation of energy independence. — Tom Allen

We are seeds as well as parasites to the earth. We can either give or take, depending on our perception of growth. — Zephyr McIntyre

The world is a beautiful place,
you just don't see it all the time. — Phil Mitchell

If I could go back to a point in history to try to get things to come out differently, I would go back and tell moses to go up the mountain again and get the other tablet. Because the Ten Commandments just tell us what we are supped to do with one another, not a word about our relationship to the earth. Genesis starts with these commands: multiply, replenish the earth, and subdue it. We have multiplied very well, we have replenished our populations very well, we have subdued it all too well, and we don't have any other instruction. — David Brower

The love for God is the love for nature. — Lailah Gifty Akita

If you want to save the humankind,
you should first take care of Nature.
It's the legacy that we leave behind,
That brings us hope, that's for sure! — Ana Claudia Antunes

God loves cleanliness.
The environment must be kept clean. — Lailah Gifty Akita

I have a conflict of interest in environmental conservation. — Mohith Agadi

The growth that we want is one that brings real benefits to the people, raises quality and efficiency of development, and contributes to energy conservation and environmental protection. — Li Keqiang

'Being green' is commendable, but I hope that people don't take too much pride and self-adoration because they shut off the water when they brushed their teeth. The truth of the matter is, conservation alone will do little to save our planet. — Naveen Jain

Yes sir, yes madam, I entreat you, get out of those motorized wheelchairs, get off your foam rubber backsides, stand up straight like men! like women! like human beings! and walk-walk-WALK upon our sweet and blessed land! — Edward Abbey

This sweet virginal primitive land will metaphorically breathe a sigh of relief
like a whisper of wind
when we are all and finally gone and the place and its creations can return to their ancient procedures unobserved and undisturbed by the busy, anxious, brooding consciousness of man. — Edward Abbey

Stream is stream. — Lailah Gifty Akita

Do not waste ... Don't waste the vegetable-washing water, splash it on the grapefruit tree instead ... Don't waste anything made of glass or plastic because glass and plastic can be reused ad nauseam ... Don't waste ... a string for retying, a rubber band for conquering dry noodles or hair, rice bags for dishcloths, fish bones for fertilizer ... Anything that comes out of the earth must be returned to the earth ... "If everyone uses more than their share, how can the earth support us?" — Thanhha Lai

To Jane Jacob's three traditional urban values of civic space, human scale and diversity, the current environmental imperative adds two more: conservation and regionalism. — Peter Calthorpe

Char Miller's lively, insightful account of the life and world of American forester Gifford Pinchot fills a vitally important gap in environmental and conservation history. Anyone captivated by the issues and controversies surrounding the preservation and development of the nation's natural heritage should read this engaging, carefully researched biography. — Carolyn Merchant

Helping people understand the impact of key environmental and human issues worldwide is something that I'm passionate about. CNN's 'Going Green' series of specials are engaging viewers around the world through important messages of conservation and hope. — Philippe Cousteau Jr.

Our inability to think beyond our own species, or to be able to co-habit with other life forms in what is patently a massive collaborative quest for survival, is surely a malady that pervades the human soul. — Lawrence Anthony

The itch for naming things is almost as bad as the itch for possessing things. Let them and leave them alone
they'll survive for a few more thousand years, more or less, without any glorification from us. — Edward Abbey

He [Aldo Leopold] recognized that industrial-age tools were incompatible with truly wild country - that roads eventually brought with them streams of tourists and settlers, hotels and gas stations, summer homes and cabins, and a diminishment of land health. He sort of invented the concept of wilderness as we now understand it in America: a stretch of country without roads, where all human movement must happen on foot or horseback. He understood that to keep a little remnant of our continent wild, we had no choice but to exercise restraint. I think it's one of the best ideas our culture ever had, not to mention our best hope for preserving the full diversity of nonhuman life in a few functioning ecosystems. — Philip Connors

Most of us still believe in the intrinsic value of nature, but I think the first century of the environmental/conservation movement demonstrated pretty clearly that this value cannot compel a civilization-wide shift toward sustainable behavior and enterprise when stacked up against the urgent economic and social needs of 7 billion people, most of whom are struggling to get out of poverty. — Edward Norton