Some of us live where we do to be closer to wildness. 

Whether we're surfers riding waves in coastal waters with Great Whites, rural folk in the lion-inhabited outback of Africa, humble writers seeking solace in the mountainous West with bears, or wildlife artists courting a rawer edge to achieve greater authenticity in our work, we yield to a larger notion of primacy.

To know that we are sharing the premises with other large animals whose desire for space needs to be respected can be both thrilling and dangerous.

How else can to explain the prolific number of artists—painters, sculptors, photographers— who feature large charismatic megafuna in their work and the huge appeal of such portrayals among collectors?

It goes beyond mere commerce.

Within the last few days in the northern Rockies, a 70-year-old man was fatally mauled by a grizzly bear just outside the eastern edge of Yellowstone National Park in Wyoming. Erwin Evert, who owned a cabin that he and his wife used in summer, wandered into an area where bear researchers had just tranquilized a bruin in order to study it.



According to reports, the area had been cordoned with signs warning of the management action in progress.  Apparently,  Mr. Evert, a botanist and committed conservationist from a suburb of Chicago, proceeded with his late afternoon walk and stumbled upon the bear that was awakening from the effects of the sedative.   Accusations have already started flying. A full investigation into the incident is now underway.

Let us not forget that Mr. Evert was devoutly committed to wildlife conservation and he chose to head West to be closer to wildness, his friend, Chuck Neal, author of Grizzlies in the Mist, says.

In Alaska, in the mountains outside of Anchorage, another man was seriously injured by a grizzly. Robert Miller, a geologist scouting for mineral deposits, was attacked on Rainy Pass in the Alaska Range when he startled a bear in the brush.  He used a gun to try and repell the attack and the bruin only left after the human played dead, adhering to textbook suggestions for what to do.  Miller harbors no ill feelings toward the animal and told a reporter:  "The bear was just doing what bears do."

In Canada's province of British Columbia, another man, a wildlife cinematographer, was charged by a mother bear and her cub after the filmmaker invaded the invisible ursid boundary that exists between a bear feeling comfortable with human presence and threatened enough to defend her territory.

Leon Lorenz had ventured nearer to a pair of bears in the Robson Valley and, with camera rolling, captured some remarkable footage that you can view here.  The protective mama and her cub only retreated after Lorenz drew a handgun and fired a warning shot over the animals.  Again, as in the Miller incident, it has stirred a debate about the utility of fending off bears with a handgun, prompting many to speculate on what happens if the bruin only becomes injured.


Fresh on shelves this summer is a new book from Montana wildlife photographer Jim Cole, survivor of two different bear attacks, that reveals loads about the author's attitude in the subtltle.  The dramatic read, Blindsided: Surviving a Grizzly Attack and Still Loving the Great Bear, echoes a theme that emerges from many human-bear encounters, which is profound reverence for the beast and no lingering ill will. 

Fatal bear attacks are exceedingly rare, as are lion attacks on people, shark attacks, Komodo dragon attacks, wolf attacks etc., etc., etc.  More people will be struck by lightning or die from bee stings or trip and fall fatally in their own homes in a couple of weeks than will be killed by animals over the course of the coming years.  Still, this fact hasn't stopped some from exploiting such incidents and extrapolating a greater sense of danger, which only creates more public fear of the outdoors and a desire to erase such animals from the landscape.