BOOK REVIEWS BY NEWSPAPER REPORTERS
Grizzly saga
Retired Idaho Fish and Game biologist details efforts to recover threatened species in new book
- By Eric Barker, of the Tribune
- May 15, 2020
- May 15, 2020 Updated 6 hrs ago
Dave Cadwallader photo
Despite their size, cunning and fearsome reputation, there are a lot of things that can befall grizzly bears as they negotiate the perils of nature.
Likewise, there are myriad ways a multiagency effort to recover a threatened species can go off the rails.
In his new book “Journey of the Bitterroot Grizzly Bear,” retired Idaho Fish and Game biologist Steve Nadeau details both.
Nadeau, a bear of a man and a grizzly advocate, spent several years as a staff biologist at the agency’s Clearwater Region in Lewiston. His book tells the tale of a young grizzly in the Selkirk Mountains of northern Idaho who eventually makes his way south into the Bitterroots and the wildlife history books. It was the first grizzly in decades known to inhabit the area identified by wildlife professionals as a potential grizzly recovery area.
Nadeau also delivers an insider’s view of the 1990s and early 2000s effort that led to a grand compromise to reintroduce grizzly bears into Idaho’s Selway-Bitterroot and Frank Church wilderness areas.
He weaves the real bear’s partially fictionalized saga in and out of his own history as a biologist working on the reintroduction effort. Both the bear and the effort would face powerful enemies, serious and minor setbacks, as well as important victories and milestones.
The bear, known as BB, nearly met his end more than once during scrapes with wolves and other grizzlies. But in time he grew strong, powerful and confident. Likewise, the reintroduction effort and Nadeau himself would come up against political foes from within and outside of government.
In the end, the effort and the bear met similar dark outcomes more than a decade ago that seemingly slammed the door on grizzly recovery. That door, however, has been pushed, and perhaps crashed, open recently by other intrepid grizzlies that have followed in BB’s steps.
“Journey of the Bitterroot Grizzly Bear” is self-published, but don’t let that steer you away. It’s a quality piece of work filled with fine writing and keen insights into bear biology, politics and human nature. The book is available on Nadeau’s website, stevenadeauauthor.com and through Barnes and Noble and Amazon.
Readers who are familiar with wildlife management in Idaho will recognize many of the names in the book, an extra incentive to give it a read. Some are woven into the story, others are listed in appendices.
“I put their names in there because I wanted people to be recognized for their efforts. This is to memorialize their efforts as well as the folks who were on the front lines.”
————
Tribune Outdoors spoke with Nadeau, of Boise, who has closely followed recent confirmed sightings, pictures and tracks of grizzly bears in north central Idaho.
“It’s an exciting time for bear supporters, but at the same time it’s a little scary thinking about these bears working their way through a gauntlet to get into central Idaho, and once they get here we are not really prepared for them,” he said.
When the plan to plant grizzly bears into the area was finally killed, so too was a designation that reintroduced bears would fall under more flexible management known as the 10J rule of the Endangered Species Act.
In its place, and by default, the government chose a “natural recovery” plan, meaning it would allow bears to find the area on their own but wouldn’t help them to do so. Those bears are fully protected as a threatened species under the ESA.
“Now that we know there are bears in the area and resident bears there, that should trigger a bunch of different things under the ESA,” Nadeau said. “So Fish and Game and (the U.S.) Fish and Wildlife Service really need to come to terms with that and realize this is what all the agencies asked for in the ‘90s — a natural recovery process, and now they have to implement what that means.”
Bear hunting is one area that concerns Nadeau. Idaho allows black bear hunters to use bait in the Clearwater Region. Bait can and has attracted grizzly bears, Nadeau’s BB among them. He believes if baiting is to be continued in the area, Fish and Game must do more to educate hunters so they don’t mistakenly shoot a grizzly. For example, he suggests bear hunters, especially those hunting in areas where grizzlies are or may be present, be required to take an online bear identification quiz. But he also said hunters can be successful without using bait and pointed to Montana, where baiting isn’t allowed, as evidence.
He notes there is an active lawsuit trying to end bear baiting on U.S. Forest Service land in Idaho unless it is specifically permitted by the federal agency. So too have there been efforts to end bear baiting statewide. Both efforts cite the danger baiting brings to grizzly bear recovery. Nadeau thinks state and federal agencies have an opportunity to head off bear baiting litigation by coming up with ways to better protect grizzlies.
“If we address (where baiting is allowed) surgically and critically, where it’s appropriate, then it could offset more broadscale closures because it shows concern for the bears,” he said.
The best thing for grizzlies he said, is to be left alone. He noted a grizzly that was photographed south of Grangeville last summer came from the Selkirk’s just like BB. That bear, a 4-year-old male, hasn’t had any known negative interactions with humans.
“I’m hoping the bear survives and doesn’t get into trouble and people just go about their lives and not worry too much, because all bears want is to be left alone,” he said.
Nadeau, who worked in Yellowstone and Glacier national parks before coming to Idaho, long ago became comfortable being in grizzly bear country. But he’s aware that fear of both the bears and the extra regulations that come with an endangered species is the most common reason people oppose recovery.
“That fear tends to wane the more time you spend in grizzly bear country,” he said. “Your senses become more attuned and alert, much like a hunter’s senses when they are out seeking game.”
As far as regulations, he said that is a hurdle that can be worked around as well.
“Those can all be mitigated through working with agencies,” he said.
Barker may be contacted at ebarker@lmtribune.com or at (208) 848-2273. Follow him on Twitter @ezebarker.
.I got to know John and Frank Craighead and told their stories, along with stories of the men and women seeking to preserve biodiversity across the Pacific Northwest, from bears and wolves to salmon, steelhead, and northern spotted owls. I covered Nadeau as he and others developed one of the first collaborative efforts between conservation groups and the Idaho timber industry to reintroduce grizzlies to the Bitterroot Mountains.
…A new generation of Idahoans relish the state’s wildness and want to make room for its wild creatures—but also want a place for humans. Still, in the 22 million acres of wilderness and roadless lands in central Idaho, they have not made room for these creatures that still generate both fear and awe. Nadeau is arguably the bruin’s best advocate in central Idaho, and in Journey of the Bitterroot Grizzly Bear he tells the story of one recovery pioneer that found his way into this wildest heart of the American West.
From the foreword by Rocky Barker, the author of two books about endangered species and Yellowstone, Saving All the Parts and Scorched Earth. He retired from the largest newspaper in Idaho, the Idaho Statesman in 2018.
REVIEWS BY RESOURCE MANAGERS
Great adventure and a hell of a ride!
Sometimes there is nothing better than a true story. Other times you’re in the mood for a fascinating fictional tale with a tragic ending, and a message of hope. All the better if your interests include wildlife conservation, endangered species, and the development of public land policy. Then, Steve Nadeau’s “Journey of a Bitterroot Grizzly Bear” is the book for you. It is a good read and one I thoroughly enjoyed. It brought back so many memories of days gone by and events forgotten.
I first met Steve in 1993 when he was part of the Bitterroot grizzly bear recovery team. I was the new Forest Supervisor on the Clearwater National Forest in the heart of the Bitterroot recovery area. I was no stranger to public controversy surrounding grizzly bears and their management, having transferred from the Targhee National Forest. The Book is impeccably researched and elegantly written. The history of the recovery effort, with its twists and turns, fits and starts, is honestly and accurately documented by Nadeau. Being the consummate professional, he tells it like it happened. At the same time, he treated the politics and people involved with dignity and respect. Nadeau has done a masterful job of knitting the fictional story of BB together with the nonfictional history of the reintroduction effort. It kept my interest and added depth to the challenge’s managers face when making controversial wildlife decisions that affect the broad public interest.
Over the years I have come to appreciate good prose. A well written sentence or paragraph, one that describes the scene, transports the reader to the very event, and captures the emotion is a true gift. Nadeau delivers in spades throughout the book. If you want to learn a bit about grizzly bear biology, their habits and habitats, threats to their continued existence, and the conflict and politics involved in public land decisions, read “Journey of the Bitterroot Grizzly Bear.” Steve Nadeau takes you on a great adventure and a hell of a ride.
“Journey of the Bitterroot Grizzly Bear” will have an honored place on my book shelf. If our paths ever cross again maybe you would autograph my copy.
James Caswell
Former Forest Supervisor, Director, Idaho Office of Species Conservation & Director, U.S. Bureau of Land Management.
I just finished reading Steve Nadeau’s book, “The Journey of the Bitterroot Grizzly Bear” . In the interest of full disclosure, I was involved in the Bitterroot Grizzly recovery effort and reviewed the manuscript of Steve’s book. He has done a great job of describing the politics, biology and public involvement in the process of a controversial wildlife management/ ESA recovery planning effort. Intertwined with the story of agency process is the story of a young grizzly bear who did his best to initiate recovery in the Bitterroot Ecosystem. Mixed with a deeply personal life story is a straight-forward discussion of bear biology and public process that should be of interest to anyone who that spent a career in natural resource management or contemplates public service as a career. I strongly recommend the book – it should be required reading in college wildlife management classes and should fuel some fierce discussions of conflicts between science, idealism, and reality.
Herb Pollard was the Bitterroot Grizzly Bear Ecosystem Subcommittee Chair for a number of years during the 1990s, retired as a regional supervisor after 28 years with Idaho Fish and Game, and then worked for the National Marine Fisheries Service on recovery of salmon in the Columbia River Basin.
In today’s world, wildlife management often involves both science and political considerations, and never more so when potentially dangerous animals are involved. Steve Nadeau’s book “Journey of the Bitterroot Grizzly Bear “intertwines both the biology of grizzly bears and the multi-year effort to restore them to the northern Rocky Mountains by one of the key figures in the process. The author began his efforts in the wilds of northern Montana and Idaho, studying the great bears, moved on to the front lines of management as a Conservation Officer, and then as a biologist that spent years pulling together necessary biological data to set the stage for re-introduction of the great bears into the northern Rocky Mountains of Idaho. Nadeau reveals the human side of the process: the political give-and-take that all too often trumps science and legal mandates and directions that guide the folks “in the trenches” every day, and in so doing reveals the passion and commitment of not only those involved in this particular process but the many hundreds of agency employees working every day to maintain and restore wildlife throughout the United States and beyond. Full disclosure: I worked with Steve for more than two decades in Idaho, and I know first-hand of his commitment … and I strongly urge that this book be considered as essential reading for everyone considering a similar career path.
Dr. Dale Toweill, retired Trophy Species Coordinator, Idaho Fish and Game. Coauthored two keystone wildlife management text books: “Elk Management in North America with Dr. Jack Ward Thomas, Wild Sheep of North America with Dr. Valerius Geist.
REVIEWS BY UNIVERSITY PROFESSORS
Those of us who have spent time in grizzly bear country realize that our senses, our eyesight and hearing are sharpened. It is one thing to wander around in country occupied by wolves, cougars, and black bears but when in grizzly country one just simply pays more attention. And this message is one of the many that one reads in Steve Nadeau’s book: Journey of the Bitterroot Grizzly Bear, BB Press, Boise, ID. It is available on Amazon and can be ordered at your local book store. This is the story of the history of the recovery efforts for grizzlies in the Bitterroots, which Nadeau kept notes on and was involved in throughout its inception until its final days.
This is about the bear that was born in the Selkirks, found its way to Kelly Creek on the North Fork of the Clearwater and was killed while investigating a bear baiting site by a guided hunter from Tennessee. You can see its live mount at the Lewiston office of the Idaho Department of Fish and Game. It is also a thoughtful presentation of what this bear might have gone through in its journey from a den where it was born through the Cabinets, the Coeur d’Alenes, to the North Fork. While no one knows what the bear did or experienced, Nadeau explains the biology and the ecology of grizzlies in alternating chapters with recovery efforts in the Bitterroots. The 4-year old bear encounters big male bears that his mother fends off, wolves that try to kill him, and black bears that he finally realizes are inferior to his presence. He learns to stay away from humans but does investigate bait sites and is close to St. Regis during a 4th of July celebration that causes him to turn west, cross the interstate and the Clark Fork River, wander down past the rivers and finally to Kelly Creek. Steve writes the trials and travails of this bear with good knowledge of bear biology and ecology. One may well identify with this bear after reading those chapters.
Nadeau does not mince words with his commentary about “Old West” politicians and others who are afraid of the bear and what its recovery might entail in limiting human activities. He also does not mince words about the “New West” people, among them the environmentalists who advocated for total protection of the grizzly that included road closures, eliminating baiting, and a recovery area that included merchantable timber.
He was in the heart of the effort to develop a draft recovery plan and describes individuals involved in the chapters that alternate with his descriptions of the grizzly’s postulated experiences. The epilogue presents records of grizzlies in the Bitterroots and adjacent areas in more recent time, reminding me that even when we think we know all about this species or that one, there are surprises in store for us to experience.
Steve is a controversial person by virtue of his affiliations with the recovery and management efforts for the larger mammalian predators with Idaho Fish & Game. His advocacy for the grizzly got him in trouble with governors, legislators, and commissioners, among others. But the issue of what a wildlife biologist stands for is raised in this book. I have the opinion that wildlife biologists have the moral obligation to stand up for the conservation, restoration, and proper management of the wildlife resource: all of it. This akin to the obligations in the medical community to do no harm. It is easy for an academic to argue for, but for the practicing biologist it can become difficult. Nadeau stood up against many forces and he and colleagues all patiently listened and attempted to address the issues raised in the recovery plan.
Over the years that the plan was being developed, a pragmatic and comprehensive alternative was created. It is said that wildlife management is informed by science but is more than that because of the human component. This means that time and patience in accomplishing the most effective management is needed, and is not in conflict with my own opinion. There’s a lot of food for thought in this book and you’ll learn a lot about grizzly bears and also about the humans involved when you read it.
Dr. Jim Peek, Professor Emeritus, Dept. of Wildlife Science, University of Idaho, Moscow.
REVIEWS BY GENERAL PUBLIC
A tale of two tales: is BB’s story an allegory for the recovery battle?
This book could have been titled a tale of two tales; one is a documentary description of the effort to reintroduce grizzlies into the Bitterroot Wilderness, while the second is a fictionalized account of a single bear, BB (Bitterroot Bear), who entered the Bitterroot on his own.
My first thought about the book is that Nadeau has used an interesting literary construct interweaving the two tales. This provides emotional content as a counterpoint to the documentary making it very readable. Both tales with intersecting story lines reveal in detail the conflicts of wildlife with both modernity and the barriers that politics and conflicting interests place to thwart environmental progress. It is obvious that grizzly bears don’t hire lobbyists.
My second thought, later in the read, was realizing that BB’s tale was perhaps an allegory for the battle for reintroduction. With this realization any unease with anthropomorphizing BB dissipated.
The documentary portion has the ring of truth about it and is backed up with footnotes and appendices. Nadeau’s writing demonstrates not only his commitment to the subject, but his level of detail suggests a long history of writing scientific reports.
I recommend this to lovers of wildlife and the wild country they live in, especially to those who are looking at careers in environment and wildlife. Actually, all who are trying to change culture with data need to read and take heed.
I have had an abiding interest in Grizzly Bears since I was 18, and I am pleased to add Nadeau’s book to my permanent collection.
John Rausch, Boise, Idaho
Why share the planet with grizzly bears?
I loved this book. Author Steve Nadeau combines two stories into one volume: The still incomplete story of grizzly bear reintroduction into the Bitterroot Mountains wilderness of central Idaho, and the fictionalized story of a real bear, a young grizzly who somehow found his way into the Bitterroots all on his own, while humans were arguing and protesting for and against reintroduction. Without so much as a single human finger lifted, the Bitterroot Bear, or BB as he’s called in the book, journeyed 200 miles from his birthplace near the Canadian border into Idaho’s central wilderness ~ becoming in the process the first grizzly to live in the Bitterroots in 60 years. Nadeau writes very well, bringing his young protagonist to life in a way that is both appealing and yet truthful. BB is no anthropomorphized teddy bear but a real young grizzly with a bear’s habits and a bear’s brain.
Nadeau is a wildlife biologist and bear expert who fleshed out the story of BB’s birth in the Selkirk Mountains to his eventual death in the Bitterroots. It’s a fascinating story of what it means to be a grizzly. No one can read it without being amazed at how intelligent and interesting these bears are. (Did you know they don’t truly hibernate? That they eat grass? And that their sense of smell is way, way better than that of any dog?) This factual-but-fictionalized account is juxtaposed with the decades-long effort to bring grizzlies back to the Bitterroots ~ with plenty of opposition along the way. The chapters about that effort won’t appeal to everyone, but they can be read through quickly or even skipped altogether, and the story of young BB won’t suffer in the least. But I recommend reading those chapters anyway, if only to understand the monumental lengths to which people will go to promote or to oppose the reintroduction of an endangered species. Those chapters also serve as a repository of knowledge for others who might be involved in reintroduction efforts (of any species) in the future, whether in Idaho or in other states.
After reading The Journey of the Bitterroot Grizzly Bear, you’ll wonder why you knew so little about these amazing animals, and you may find your appetite whetted for more knowledge. I hope the author will write a book for children about grizzly bears, so that the younger generation can grow up appreciating these marvelous creatures and understanding why sharing our planet with them is good for all of us.
Mrs. T, amazon reader
SCIENCE REVIEWS
BOOK REVIEW -JOURNAL OF WILDLIFE MANAGEMENT
Journey of the Bitterroot Grizzly Bear: The Inside Story
of a Grizzly Reintroduction Effort and the Journey of a
Remarkable Young Grizzly. Steve Nadeau. 2020. BB
Press, Boise, Idaho, USA. 322 pp. $18.95 paperback.
ISBN: 978‐1‐0878‐7249‐0
Journey of the Bitterroot Grizzly Bear is a highly readable, interesting, and accurate account of a major effort to restore grizzly bears (Ursus arctos) to an area in the western United States from which they had been exterminated. Steve
Nadeau, author, recounts the story of this (ultimately unsuccessful) effort from his perspective as a biologist with Idaho Department of Fish and Game (IDFG); IDFG has wildlife management authority over most of the designated Bitterroot Recovery Area. Nadeau is a bear and wolf (Canis lupus) expert with intimate knowledge of the reintroduction area and process.
The book describes the positions and personalities of the various institutions involved in the restoration effort. In alternating chapters, Nadeau recounts an imagined reconstruction of what the journey of a real bear probably was like from a population on the border with Canada into the Bitterroot Recovery Area. This 4‐year‐old male grizzly, named BB, was misidentified as a black bear (Ursus americanus) and shot in 2007 by a hunter at a bait station. This bear was the first documented grizzly in the Bitterroot Recovery Area in >60 years. The story of BB’s trip provides a framework for Nadeau to describe the natural and manmade vicissitudes currently facing the survival and dispersal of individual bears in the western United States. This trip is also an allegory for the recovery effort and for Nadeau’s own professional journey.
The proposed Bitterroot Recovery Area is huge (1,3375,930 ha or 13,759 km2), encompassing large, roadless tracts designated as wilderness and surrounding UnitedStates National Forests that are subject to multiple usemandates. The Bitterroot Recovery Area is the best remaining area in the United States to re‐establish a healthy and viable grizzly population. Current carrying capacity for grizzlies in the Bitterroots, however, is unquestionably lower than it was when the streams in it teamed with Pacific salmon (Oncorhynchus spp.) during the nineteenth century. The Bitterroots represent a key potential linkage between existing populations, including the currently isolated population of grizzlies in the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem.
Nadeau discusses the many complicated steps required to develop reintroduction alternatives; these steps are broadly representative of the complexity required to make progress toward objectives under the United States Endangered
Species Act (ESA). For grizzlies, progress is even more difficult because of perceptions that the species is dangerous to personal safety and private property. Nadeau characterizes some of the conflicts that existed: “…we witnessed new
and possibly disastrous battle lines being formed: environmentalists vs. environmentalist and biological purity vs. sleeping with the enemy” (pg. 127). Additionally, Nadeau describes how extractive and predator unfriendly
interests of the old west were pitted against ecosystem restoration priorities of the new west.
Although Nadeau identifies himself as a personal advocate for grizzly restoration in the Bitterroots, he is careful throughout the book to avoid making value judgments about the various positions taken by different institutions and groups. One thing that made this restoration unique was the position of 1 traditionally old west coalition (i.e.,The Resource Organization on Timber Supply; ROOTS).
The ROOTS coalition indicated early on they would support grizzly reintroduction under certain conditions that would allow continued and limited timber harvests on national forest lands surrounding the recovery area. They also wanted more involvement of local citizens in grizzly management decisions; this was in recognition of the widespread mistrust in Idaho of the federal government. Two major conservation organizations (i.e., The National Wildlife Federation and Defenders of Wildlife), the United States Fish and Wildlife Service’s Grizzly Bear Recovery Coordinator (C. Servheen), and others worked with ROOTS to develop a proposal acceptable to both sides. The ROOTS alternative specified reintroduction under Section 10(j) of the ESA (experimental and non‐essential)
and involvement of a Citizens Management Committee. This alternative became the preferred alternative in the environmental impact statements. The ROOTS compromise, however, was strongly opposed by a number of other conservation groups who developed what became known as the Conservation Biology (CB) alternative. The CB alternative rejected use of 10(j) and the citizens’ management concepts, and included larger areas protected from logging. Other alternatives provided for either recovery by natural dispersal (no action) or prevention of recovery.
At the end of the W. J. Clinton administration, the ROOTS‐backed proposal was adopted by the Department of Interior as a final Record of Decision (ROD). However, the incoming G. W. Bush administration appointed a Secretary of Interior who refused to fund the ROD. Nadeau points out, “Ultimately, fewer than 500 votes in Florida, USA, had changed grizzly bear recovery on the other side of
the continent” (pg. 242). During the subsequent 19 years, the Bitterroot Recovery Area has remained barren of a grizzly population.
Journey of the Bitterroot Grizzly Bear is easy reading in spite of the bureaucratic nature of its primary topic. Anecdotes about Nadeau’s personal career path, disagreements within and external to his agency, the story of BB, and some of his
personal misadventures add to the book’s general interest. He recounts, for example, a woman opposed to the reintroduction effort who characterized proponents of the effort as condom users. The grizzly bear recovery effort in the United States is unique because of involvement from directors of state,
federal, and tribal organizations with management authorities over lands and wildlife; all part of the Interagency Grizzly Bear Recovery Committee (IGBC)
and its recovery area‐specific subcommittees. I thought the book would have benefited from more insights into how the IGBC functioned during this restoration effort, and the importance of it in the development of the final ROD.
I recommend Journey of the Bitterroot Grizzly Bear because it is an instructive case history about the ESA process and about grizzly bear conservation efforts in the United States. Some readers may disapprove of the characterizations of the fictionalized experiences of BB during his trip from near the Canadian border to the Bitterroots. I, however, thought these characterizations were useful.
—Sterling Miller , Alaska Department Fish and Game
(retired) and National Wildlife Federation (retired), Lolo,
MT 59847, USA. E‐mail: sterlingmil@gmail.com
IBA (INTERNATIONAL ASSOCIATION FOR BEAR RESEARCH AND MANAGEMENT)
In his retirement, Steve Nadeau has written a book: “Journey of the Bitterroot Grizzly Bear” that I was asked to review for the IBN. It’s only fair that I begin with my biases. I know Steve and I like Steve. Furthermore, right near the beginning of the book he mentions his 30th birthday that he had with myself and “Bruce’s lovely wife, Celine”. He’s buttered me up – and I’m a softy.
After more or less limiting my reading to science journals for 40 years, Celine (my lovely wife) suggested that, in my retirement, I diversify my outlook and try reading novels by some of the great writers of the English language. I was in the middle of an award winning novel by Salman Rushdie when the Steve’s book arrived in the mail. I anxiously dropped Rushdie and started Nadeau. I’m glad I did.
Steve has some surprisingly nice paragraphs. Reading them took my thoughts directly to the mountains and the feeling of deep cold that I often felt, years ago, when doing caribou work in the high mountains during mid-winter. But elsewhere, a paragraph would take my mind to the expanse of lush alpine while tracking bears in summer. But alas, I don’t think Steve will win a Booker or Nobel for literature. As Rushdie would say, it’s “the world of linear narrative, the universe of what happened next”. Personally, I like the linear narrative and Steve’s book has more substance than the fluff that some great writers bog me down with. I finished Steve’s book in 3 days. I’m still working on Rushdie.
Before I go further, I must, for those of you that may not know of the Bitterroot Ecosystem (BE), tell you the basics of what I learned scattered, here and there, through the book. It’s clear that Steve knows the BE like the back of his big, old wrinkly hand, but those less familiar would have benefited from a concise description near the beginning of the book. At over 14,000 km2, the BE is the largest wilderness in the lower 48 states of the USA. It is located mostly in the state of Idaho but crosses into the western side of Montana. All the grizzly bears there had been killed, and for 60 years, there have been no grizzly bears detected in the BE, but a few males have recently shown up. The BE is about 70 km from the closest occupied grizzly bear habitat in Montana and is an official recovery area.
There are really three books within the “Journey…” First, covering only a couple of dozen pages, is a linear narrative of Steve’s upbringing. Yes, I know, that’s sounds boring. I thought so too when I began but then I got into it. Steve had a youth much like, I suspect, many of us IBA members – hanging out in the bush hunting and fishing. After enjoying this minor part of the book, I thought it would be interesting to read 20 pages of other IBA members’ early days, careers, and thoughts, particularly some North Americans, a few Europeans, others from Asia. I’d buy that book if the writers did it well.
Most of “ The Journey….” is two other stories intertwined among chapters. One is really a novel about a male grizzly bear Steve called the Bitterroot Bear or BB for short. We know by his genetics that BB was born in the Selkirk Mountains, perhaps near the Canadian border, in early 2003 and was killed in September 2007 in the BE by a hunter who thought it was a black bear. The four years between these events is what Steve, with a blend of imagination and knowledge of bears, filled in. I found it, particularly since it was written by an old bear biologist and not a professional writer, to be a good interpretation of what may have happened. Since I am a grandfather and, once again reading stories to kids, I’d say this section is good for anyone from 9 year olds up to old codgers like myself. I will warn you, however, that there are a few biological points that I won’t say are wrong, but I would like to discuss them with Steve over a box of beer around a campfire. See if you can find them.
Most of the book is about the twenty plus years of bureaucratic and political process underlying the attempt to recover grizzly bears (and wolves to a lesser extent) in the BE. It highlights to me, once again, how complex the “system” is in the US. During this entire process, Steve was a central participant in this muddle of Federal, State, local community, Indigenous tribes, industry, environmental groups and politicians at all scales. It was a cast of hundreds and Steve seems to have known them all. Having worked closely with US colleagues for decades, I was somewhat familiar, but being a Canadian, not perfectly fluent in US process (or Acronyms!). I now know much more than I did.
Is it worth reading page after page on US personalities, politics, and process? I found it interesting and informative. Unfortunately, I also found it similar to my experiences in Canada, particularly with trying to halt caribou extirpation, which is our species with huge conservation challenges. Steve covers the process in detail. At one side of the figurative table there is industry, both extractive and recreational, trying to minimise or eliminate any constraints and costs but still trying to look good and progressive. On the other side of the table are the environmentalists trying to get what they think is best for bears, wolves, and other species and in doing so, highlight emotional conquests so more money flows their way. Government biologists and technical staff sit between these groups and try, as we say in Canada, to stick-handle through the competing interests and still recover grizzlies. In a slightly different world are the politicians trying to look good to their base while striving to find an excuse for inaction. No wonder so much time, energy, and money swirls clockwise into the ether before anything actually gets done on the ground. For decades I have realized that my conservation heroes are the agency folks in the trenches fighting for wildlife, day after day after day. Steve’s was in the trenches of conservation and does a fine job of describing the never ending battle.
Thanks Steve for putting in the effort to document the history. As my Ausi friends would say, “good on you mate”.
Dr. Bruce McLellan, Senior scientist, B.C. Ministry of the Environment, British Columbia, CANADA. (retired)