While John Muir walked a thousand miles exploring the inland plant life off the east coast, Aldo Leopold observed the changes in life throughout the seasons in Sand County (Part One).
Leopold discusses Muir's strong influence on his work, though he doesn't seem to mention Muir's walk as much as Muir's conservation work in California. Perhaps this is how Leopold chooses to make an "almanac," or "an annual table, or (more usually) a book of tables, containing a calender of months and days, with astronomical data and calculations, ecclesiastical and other anniversaries, besides other useful information, and, in former days, astrological and astrometeorological forecasts" (Oxford English Dictionary). By observing the seasons changes in one place, Leopold was able to comprehend the complexity of nature's system even in a concentrated area. He considers himself a landlord because he does indeed "own" land and has "tenants" that pay him in some way. He writes as if he were the wind (intentionally or unintentionally reflecting Muir) and falls in love with the sky dance of a bird.
Perhaps one of the most compelling aspects about his seasonal observation of one place is that his observations constantly pay gratitude to the implications of each aspect. For instance, he notes that someone who has an old oak has a historical library, or a "theatre of evolution" (32). While Muir felt overwhelmed by the grandeur of everything he saw, Leopold has already begun to say something more than the sheer majesty of the seasons surrounding him. It took Muir several hundred miles before he could formulate his excitement into an explanation or purpose. Perhaps this is because Muir was just beginning his journey, both of the walk and of his life as a "harmonist," and Leopold has had time to let these sights marinate and make sense to him.
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