Machetes for bushwacking.

Yes, there are pristine places that should always remain pristine. There are places that have been compromised that deserve every chance to recuperate. I think we can all agree on that. However, to imply that all places should be "hands off" is misdirected. To continue that inflexible line of logic: your house was built on what was once untouched land. Every time you paint that house and maintain that lawn you are preventing nature from reclaiming it to a natural state. So does this line of logic end at your property line?

Hey and congratulations on your marriage! Really looking forward to the honeymoon trip report after that amazing proposal trip report!

You make a perfectly valid point. However, the vast majority of us live in places that were previously populated and built upon before we even were born. You can't blame me for hindering nature by upkeeping a 50 year old house that is in a 60 year old subdivision. But, the choice to walk into the woods and either utilize LNT principles or not is very much a clear and present choice that makes a very immediate impact.

BTW, thanks for the kind words on my marriage!

A wilderness isn't going to suddenly cease to be pristine after I slice through some bushes in my way. Have you ever seen what a moose can do when it walks through some thick alder? Maybe we should start teaching those moose LNT practices. Is it leave no trace if I used a piece of flint instead?
The leave no trace principle has already, in a way, been abandoned with maintained trails. If everyone was bushwhacking and dispersed camping, most wildernesses would be a much more "pristine, even counting potential erosion from walking and stomping of vegetation.
In the jungle, machete trails don't last long at all. Anything that you would need to cut with a machete would fall would be similar.
I practice leaving no trace, however consider the literal definition of leaving no trace. It means make sure that nobody will walk by and notice that someone has camped there, it doesn't mean don't touch anything. I have accomplished that, (in terms of someone walking through, not focused inspection) even after blasting a long log fire all night long, sleeping on top of some pine bows with a primitive shelter above me. I actually had a really hard time finding any remnants of my fire when I came back and the forest was still pretty cluttered with dead wood. So I don't really what you are getting at. I have witnessed the effects of overuse and misuse in the wilderness and I am competent enough to not contribute to it. Obviously what I described above is only reasonable in a well wooded national forest, which most people on this forum don't seem to ever step foot into.
However, I do see your point on machetes. I do think that anything I would cut would replace itself quickly, and would not be very discernible to the average passerby. And it would obviously be in place of well used trails, in obviously underused areas. It definitley would not harm the ecosystem in any measurable way, and hopefully nobody would get upset about it.

Also, I think that big, cleanly cut sawed logs along trails are ugly and it actually diminishes the experience for me.

From what I gather, there are at least 429 logging companies in California: http://www.manta.com/mb_44_E019B_05/logging/california

And from the limited information I know about trees, is that they are huge parts of the ecosystem of the woods. They pretty much *are* the woods, and house lots of animals, as well as are hosts to many symbiotic fungi and lichen.

So let me see if I understand what is being discussed here about Justin's actions:

1. They may be illegal.
2. They are not LNT.
3. They are part of the problem.

To those of you making the above claims, you ought to support them (and no, I am not going to "just google it" and do your homework for you).

After you are done demonstrating the above three claims, there is the next issue of how there seems to be some kind of cognitive dissonance here with our environment, or at least the environment of CA. I am not able to wrap my head around this:

Justin chopping through some blackberry brush = "bad" and/or "unacceptable"

vs.

429 logging companies chopping down lots and lots of trees for profit = "good" and/or "acceptable"

It very well may be that what Justin is doing is illegal, I don't know as I don't live in CA. But let us assume for the sake of argument that it is illegal… so what? I don't see why we ought to assume that all laws are 100% perfect and always "right" or "ethical". I, for example, firmly believe that cannabis sativa ought to be legal, and so does Holland and a few other nations. Yet it is illegal in the grand majority of Europe and North America.

Finally, Justin also raises an excellent point about the trail crews that go and clear the established trains. Some of us, myself included, happen to like a more "raw" or "natural" trail, and like climbing over logs that have fallen in the middle of the trail. Yet most LNT zealots are either fine with that or ignore it.

If you are going to hijack a thread and turn it into a debate, that's fine, I actually enjoy friendly debate and love to learn and have my opinions and beliefs challenged. But at least take it seriously, i.e. support your claims, give links, be specific, acknowledge known inconsistencies or issues with your arguments, etc.

"Justin chopping through some blackberry brush = "bad" and/or "unacceptable"
vs.
429 logging companies chopping down lots and lots of trees for profit = "good" and/or "acceptable""

Where did anyone who suggested slashing living foliage wasn't LNT say that they thought that industrial logging was OK? They didn't, did they? I am willing to bet that any of the people who are expressing mild, polite concern about the use of a machete would be very concerned about industrial clear-felling. In my case I'd see the machete and the logging truck on a continuum, and largely an expression of the same man against nature attitude.

I never said that anyone suggested that LNT should be strictly adhered to says that industrial logging was okay, with respect I think you missed my point or I was not clear enough.

I am just pointing out that in the society that Justin lives in, industrial logging exists and is legal. It is kind of absurd to me that people that live in the same society are being critical of hacking down some blackberry bushes (which to my knowledge are not endangered, but actually somewhat overgrown) when there is such large scale destruction going on. I also thought that it ought to be mentioned to put things into context here.

And in your case, if you claim that the machete and the logging truck are on the same continuum (man against nature), I find that absurd as well. I mean, you had to type that reply. You know. On a computer? I am guessing that you also drive a car or use public transportation, don't make all of your own clothing (thus buy clothing, much of which is made in 3rd world nations), and seeing as this is a backpacking site, I am guessing you own camping gear. All of that is "against nature", and frankly I find that people casting the first stone about LNT, or say hippies in coffee shops all over the world, are often blissfully ignorant to the continuum of destruction and/or against nature that they are on.

What I am saying is that we are all guilty of some kind of destruction or expression of us against nature. Unless of course you live out in the woods, made your own cabin out of fallen wood, own nothing, and only eat wild edibles.

I would suggest that Justin chopping down blackberry bushes is pretty low on the list of environmental priorities, and perhaps we ought to get our priorities (myself included) straighter.

EDIT: grammar

I find this suggested dividing line between "man and nature" to be quite interesting.
Is someone suggesting that man is not a natural creature, and is somehow not part of nature? I certainly hope not, because that is not a supportable position.
Man is part of nature, and is a natural creature, and everything that man does is natural for him to do.

What we are really seeing in this discussion is a political argument, which draws a line between man and nature, for the purpose of creating social control schemes enforced by force of government, under a specious premise. In other words, "You WILL do as I say, or harm will come to you at the hands of the official monopoly of force". It's an excuse for some to rule over others by edict.

Now, I realize that this political argument exists, and that it is specious, but that it sometimes gains sway over enough people to create oppression against others in the form of laws backed up by gov't force.
And so that is why I decided to insulate myself from the oppression of others impinging on my freedoms by purchasing my own tract of land to do my hiking and camping and hunting and fishing, and any other purpose I wish to use it for.
It didn't happen overnight, and it took a long time of working and saving, but now I have a place which is not subject to external forces in anywhere near the same ways as government owned parks.

I used my right to own private property as a hedge against incursion against my freedom of living, by an increasingly intrusive government which seeks to totally control my life. It is likely going to get even worse before it gets better, so I would recommend this course of action for others who may seek to at least partially insulate themselves from the prying intrusion and control of outside forces, by having your own private property in the form of land. In fact, land is much cheaper right now than it has been in the recent past, and is a good value for people who seek freedom.

To sum up, this subject is NOT about "man vs nature", but actually is ALL about "man vs man", and the convoluted control schemes that some men concoct in order to gain control over others. THAT is the real conflict description.

Edited: Spelling

Whoa! Justin asked about hacking a few blackberry bushes, not logging first growth redwoods!
I seriously doubt he is going to create a path of destruction visible from space with a simple hand machete.
I have lived in nothern California for 42 years. The blackberry bushes are indestructible here in the coastal mountains. My neibors have taken a bulldozer through a thicket and the berries came right back the next year. They are like the ubiquitous Poison Oak plants. Some folks take to pouring gasoline on those, now thats REALLY not LNT!
Guess what? the Poison Oak, like the blackberry, comes right back.
The real LNT issue here is the trail that might be created when others are tempted to follow the same path Justin creates. Soil erosion lasts forever.
I've seen a few folks with machetes in my travels. About the only time i saw a person using one it was for making annoying chopping sounds on a dead log around the campfire.
To answer the question in the original post: I have a Collins Legitimus machete. It's a big 24" long, broad bladed, heavy chopper. Found it in a stump in the backwoods of the Santa Cruz mountains. Though I have never considered it to take while hiking, I have found it very useful for brushing around the house. The machete is superb for vines and thick growth of climbing ivy that chokes small trees. For the trail i would think a small pair of hand clippers would be more practical but whatever.
As for the Man vs Nature issue brought up here:
Life lives by killing and eating other life.
We can argue about the degree or motive for such action, but that fact always remains.
"It is a beautiful Opera except that it hurts." -Joseph Campbell
.
.

Just wanted to make a few more clarifications.

I personally would probably not chop down the blackberry bush, but go around as best I could. In this situation, I just don't see taking a machete plus the work involved as worth it when that weight, time, and energy could be put to other uses. However I don't judge Justin for chopping em, he is not hurting anyone or doing anything I see as that unethical–or at least, if it is unethical no more than say me and pretty much everyone else on this forum buying gas for our cars.

Plus, there are times that I have and would bring and use a machete/big knife/ax/saw, depending on where I am going and what I am doing. I do my best to LNT, I honestly do, but there are some gray areas of LNT, and I think Justin's situation is one of them. Is it really *wrong* for him to hack down some blackberry bushes? If so, why? And how are we to evaluate/contrast this in light of the context I have given, i.e. logging?

The point about creating a trail and thus soil erosion is well taken, I must say. So I would ask Justin if he thinks that his actions would cause a new trail and then erosion. It seems like this is a pretty isolated area and that the blackberries would just re-grow, but I am just speculating.

I help my landlords cut trail in their thousands (literally) acres they own along the coast. Blackberries and poison oak do grow right back and I personally have no problem cutting them back.

The blackberries that Justin is so wantonly chopping are a non-native invasive species that has taken over large tracts of land in northern California and Oregon (not sure about Washington, but my guess is that it's there too). It typically forms large stands of impenetrable thorny brush. The berries are tasty, but you'll only get the ones on the outside of the thicket unless you want to bleed for them!

If anything, Justin is doing the native flora a favor in removing any amount of this noxious, invasive weed. Anyone that gets rid of Himalayan blackberries on the west coast has my support!

First of all, my comments were pointed more at general LNT principles and using tools like machetes on public land, not a personal attack on Justin.

Some thoughts:

It is interesting to talk about where it is appropriate to hack away at the undergrowth. Who gets to decide?

I live in an area (Western Washington), where logging companies have done a full scale rape of the land, including ripping off the local Native Americans in the process. I've sat through dinner with a Weyerhauser executive making comments about the 'tree huggers' and it was like some sort of stereotype coming to life. They really are that evil.

There are hundreds of thousands of acres of slash and second growth forests. A clearcut is a like a war zone where incredible violence was used to take the forest apart. The "harvest" in the 1960's into the mid-1970's went at a rapid pace as the lumber industry realized the limitations of the forests and the changing political climate. Granted, people wanted houses, but they had no idea what the process was— or didn't care.

In some places the land has been allowed to return to its natural state and it does heal, but very slowly. It was amazing to walk a closed road that I traveled over in a truck in 1966. In places it has grown back to a path and the streams have all jumped the culverts and destroyed them, making a mockery of our efforts to contain and control nature. You can easily see where an old area was logged and you transition to old growth forest, 100 years later. The scars are deep, where the roads were cut, the timber was dragged, with the erosion scars and poisoned water and soil from the rotting cedar left behind because it wasn't "marketable."

There are trends in development and population growth in rural areas. In the example I know best, the Kittitas valley in Eastern Washington, has seen large developments right up against the national forest, bringing the edge of the suburbs to the woods where I hiked and played as a kid. The major developer is a subsidiary of a railroad, with its own logging company to boot. And the railroad got all the land for free in a 19th Century give-away to get the railroads across the West.

Again, using my own lifetime (57 years), the population of Washington State has gone from 2.5 million in 1954 to 6.5 million today. The pressure on the rural areas is immense, and with every advance of the suburbs is an advance of of ATV trails, snowmobiles, RV campgrounds, and the pollution, fires, water issues and noise that accompany the development and population growth.

So, my concern is that the natural areas are shrinking and even a small percentage of my 4 million "new neighbors" turned loose with machetes may do more than just a little damage. One guy thinks it is okay if he just hacks blackberries, but some other guy clears small trees and brush and builds bridges so he can run his snowmobiles through in the winter. I've seen that first hand and it is outrageous.

Once you get started, it's everyone for themselves (AKA anarchy) and there just isn't room for that Pioneer Man attitude any longer. We are living on a different planet than our parents, let alone the folk who wandered out here in the 1850's. There just isn't much left. We need to travel the natural areas wisely, observing and enjoying what is there and leave it as we found it for the next person to enjoy: each time, every time.

Please leave your machetes at home.

First of all, I laud Dale's well thought out, intelligent, and respectful contribution to a controversial topic. Thanx!

To attempt to answer your question about who gets to decide what to hack down: the individual, of course. Each situation is different, and ultimately the individual must take the risks that go along with the action. Perhaps the risks are too small in cases where it is outright unethical, I would of course point out. For example, illegal logging by blackmarket outfits looking to make a quick buck. I am not sure what the penalty is for getting caught for such a crime, but it should probably be harsher than it is.

In this situation–Justin and the blackberries–there are some unknowns that make it difficult to have an accurate account of the matter. I am still not sure if it is illegal, and thus, if he would get a fine or whatever. I have a hard time seeing his actions as unethical from what I understand of it (he didn't even cut the blackberry bushes down, but is planning on it). Even if it is illegal, I don't think it ought to be, or that he should have to pay a fine or whatever, unless we are able to prove that he is doing serious damage or is directly harming another person by his actions. The point about erosion is a solid one, as I have already mentioned.

Things like the example you gave are easier to figure out that the snowmobile people should ought not have done that. You can make a bridge out of dead/fallen wood, or go and buy very cheap wood (even get it free from a junk yard or dumpster) to make a bridge. Trees, as I mentioned earlier, are a bigger part of the ecosystem. Blackberries are not as big a part, and from what other people are saying (I am admittedly assuming they are correct that this plant is invasive and a problem plant, again I don't know, don't live there), Justin might even be doing the area a service by removing the plant.

You have your finger on the bigger, larger, more important problem, which is industrial logging. LNT gray areas are the proverbial drop in the bucket next to them, and it is worth mentioning this for a productive discussion (and hopefully more productive actions against bigger threats to the environment). However I have read far, far more posts complaining about LNT (including some very recent ones) on this forum. I have read none about logging, other than Dale's post above. In short, we got bigger fish to fry, people, if we want to preserve the woods so we can continue to enjoy them backpacking/camping.

I also think that some people that like to complain about small stuff like LNT have ulterior motives. There is a sense, a vibe, that some of the people that vent about LNT do it to feel superior than those dumb hicks that chop down trees for bon fires and throw their candy bar wrappers around. While I don't like these actions either, I and every one else in the western world pretty much, is just as guilty if not more so to damaging the environment than those hicks. I don't know much about what the process is to create cuben fiber, but I am guessing it is worse on the earth in general than the trees cut down and the candy bar wrappers left by dumb hicks. Even the vegan, hybrid driving, commune living, tree hugging hippie is guilty to one extent or another–some are even more destructive than the hicks. I see some of these hippies in coffee shops with iPhones, laptops, etc. Very, very few people are off the grid and out of society 100%, and those are the only ones that are not guilty of contributing to all this mess.

We are all guilty, but we ought to do what we can when we can to be less guilty of course–and we ought to also prioritize how we can be less guilty.

Is stopping the chopping blackberries a priority to the environment? If so, why?

If I want to go where someone has cut all brush, I will go to the city park. I like the park and use it often. But sometimes I want to get out for a different experience, so I go backpacking. It does take away from the wilderness experience for me if someone has cut the foliage along my trail. If my trail is full of bushwhacked areas, I wouldn't go back. Now, if the park service wants to eradicate an invasive species,fine(and good luck). I just don't see the cutting of vegetation as being consistent with those of us who backpack to be among the vegetation. I don't think many of us like to hike and camp among areas that are bushwhacked(trail maintenance aside). I have no problem with people who want to whack saplings on land they buy though.

"It means make sure that nobody will walk by and notice that someone has camped there, it doesn't mean don't touch anything"

Incorrect.

If I pick a flower you will probably never notice it, but it will no longer be there for the next person to enjoy. I can pick up an arrowhead from the river bank and you will never know it, but it will no longer be there for the next person to enjoy. Both of these examples go against the LNT principles even though you would never notice it. Sure you can touch stuff, dont think Im being too literal, but you cant destroy it just because "No one will notice"

Thanks Cesar!
It's so much complicted than picking at someone else over a couple of issues, while either ignoring or being unaware of other issues at large. Educating others through meaningful and honest discussions goes a lot further than pointing fingers and citing regulations or other PC practices. And while one tries to educate another, keep an open mind that you might possibly learn something during the exchange as well.

The only difference is kudzu doesn't have tasty berries to disguise its noxious, invasive qualities.

If in the Southeast, you'd try to clear out kudzu and think you were being ecologically sensitive, you'd feel pretty much the same way about Himalayan blackberries in the Northwest.

Sorry for posting on this, but the comparison (which isn't perfect) just came to me, and might help some folks from the right coast understand better.

So, any other machete recommendations?

Ignoring the philosophical battle and the wielding of sharp blades, just thought I'd toss out some Manzanita information. Take it for what it is; not as an indictment, nor as support, of the whacking of bush.

It's illegal to cut Manzanita without permission in California.

There are something on the order of 60 species of Manzanita. A dozen or so are on federal or state rare/threatened/endangered lists. The rest seem to be doing fine.

Coastal varieties seem to be the most at risk. Ice plant is a jerk. Development doesn't help. Manzanita does not propagate fantastically well.

A quick Google around the internet reveals it to be a favorite for wedding decor. Who knew.

http://www.calflora.org/ will give you a list of what's growing in the area you're hiking. A quick search for Manzanita in Sonoma County reveals quite a few varieties.

One of the most endangered, the Vine Hill Manzanita, is right in your (Justin's) backyard. (A fungus seems to be wiping it out.): http://www.rareplants.cnps.org/detail/24.html

Blackberries are a problem. I have seen whole houses engulfed in them. If you want to take them all out on your private land at your own volition, more power to you. If you want to organize volunteers to remove invasive plants with the approval of the public land managers, God bless you! BUT, for each person to take on their own concept of what belongs where and what can or can't be hacked on public land just doesn't fly.

I have dozens of accounts (on other forums) of people going out to play "suvivorman" and hacked the daylights out of brush and small trees to make shelters and campfires and they left a small swath of destruction behind them. I remember one trip report where two guys made a perfectly level 12'x16' campsite and bemoaned the fact that they had to work so hard to do it. They were astounded that they could be fined and/or jailed for it. This kind of idiocy in the national forests is not at all rare.

The issue really isn't about Jason clearing a trail through the blackberries, but rather every nitwit who can stumble into Walmart with $12 and running around the woods hacking things up with a machete, or hatchet, or whatever. Too many people lack the discretion to be in the woods with tools. It is the wrong message, plain and simple.

Here is a video of the revered Ray Mears cutting up 20+ green trees, pulling up roots and moss to make a demo survival shelter. These are great skills in an emergency. Great fun on private land with permission, but NOT in wilderness areas. This is the sort of stuff that concerns me.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E6JksGtPBg8&NR=1

As an interesting sideline to this discussion about LNT ethics, I suggest that interested folks pick up the book "1491", by Charles C. Mann. He brings together newer research in archeology and anthropology on the "New World", and basically says that our notion of the sparsely inhabited native living in balance with nature, never altering it but living within it is completely erroneous. At the time that Columbus discovered these continents, there may have been more people living on this continent than in Europe. Also, the "pristine" forests found by the colonists may well have been aggressively managed hunting preserves, and in the case of the Amazon, actively "farmed" as a tree-based crop farm. Just an interesting perspective on the environment.

I'm in the middle of "1491" right now. Fascinating read.

Regardless, there are MANY more people on the planet now, however inaccurate our estimation of Western Hemisphere population. Even with all the activism, we're grinding up the environment with hideous efficiency. Our lust for energy, plastic, agricultural chemicals and all the rest pales anything the 15th Century could produce.

The bottom line: be nice to Nature, it likes to get even!

Vincent,

I can't say I've handled the Extrema Ratio Khuk, although I have seen it. Aesthetically, I find it to be a very nice interpretation, but as you mentioned the price is pretty "extrema".

Another similarly priced interpretation are the Busse Killa Zilla models. Which I've also never really had my hands on. User reports are quite good, but the level of busse fandom reaches unimaginable heights, such to the point that anybody saying anything other than how great they are gets instantly lambasted by the hordes of the faithful. My impression was, that like all Busse wares, they're built to withstand Armageddon, which likely means they weigh a ton.

Generally my perception of the high end production "khukris" is that they tend to be overbuilt, and highly priced, compared to the top end Nepalese offerings. If I was going to spend the kind of money the aforementioned "production" khukris command, I'd much rather employ a custom blade maker/smith, as opposed to a production shop. Bill Siegle just recently sold some gorgeous looking khuks on BFs that seemed to really do the design justice: http://www.bladeforums.com/forums/showthread.php/869525-Kukris!!!!!***SOLD-OUT****?highlight=kukri

"And in your case, if you claim that the machete and the logging truck are on the same continuum (man against nature), I find that absurd as well."

I think that Dale expressed very clearly what I (and others) are saying: other than on your own land, or as part of an organised trail maintenance programme, I'd rather that people didn't go around slashing plants or other living things. You, or Justin might act responsibly, but there are plenty who don't. A couple of examples from personal experience:

– the guy who drove his 4WD along a trail in the Victorian alps – widening it where necessary – to take over an emergency hut with his dog (illegal in national parks in Australia) and used his chainsaw to cut down living snow gums for the nice big fire he built;

– the guy in Japan who stomped on every mushroom along a trail in the Japan Alps "to protect the children" – there were no children within hours of that place, and it was sufficiently remote and steep that it was unlikely that there would be;

– the people building huge bonfires on the beach of Australia's oldest national park

– some friends on a ski tour in the Australian Alps who killed
the "diseased" "mice" "infesting" the hut they were staying in: oops, they were actually antechinus, a completely protected marsupial.

As Dale said, the wilderness can't take this kind of sustained pressure.

"So, any other machete recommendations?"
Angelo Radano

Angelo,
For the lightest weight that I am aware of, the Condor Eco-Light 14"(14" blade length) machete weighs only about 13 ounces, is very good quality(Imacasa/Condor) comes pre-sharpened from the factory to razor sharp, has a safety-orange colored handle, and is under $25.