The One Animal That Humbles Humankind

[douglas9]

When Doug Peacock returned from his second tour in Vietnam, he was ready for some peace and quiet. He found it in the wilds of Montana and Wyoming, where Yellowstone National Park provided refuge for thousands of species of wildlife. Peacock learned to live among these creatures in the mountains and on the plains. An encounter with a grizzly bear, however, would change everything.

“My companions ended up being grizzlies,” Peacock says in Ben Moon’s short documentary Grizzly Country. “Those bears saved my life.”

Grizzlies, classified as an endangered species, have dwindled in number, from the estimated 50,000 bears that roamed between the Pacific Ocean and the Great Plains in the 1800s to just over 1,000 today.

In the film, Peacock explains how observing the bears in their natural habitat inspired him to become a naturalist. “The voiceless really needed a human voice,” he says, going on to describe how he has dedicated his life to documenting grizzly behavior and advocating for the preservation of their habitat.

https://www.theatlantic.com/video/index/588769/grizzly-country/

[nmgaucho]

1. Love this

Doug is one of my heroes

[2naSalit]

2. Mr. Peacock is quite an unusual dude...

lives near where I live, had to read his first book in college. I've met him twice but both times were public events so we couldn't chat much. I've had more conversations with his wife than him!

[gtar100]

3. Would love to hear more about his attitude towards bears and other big animals

and how to best be in the wilds when encountering them. I hike in an area where mountain lions, bears and coyotes live. They really do, for the most part, keep to themselves and avoid humans but there are those moments. I mostly see them from a distance but a bear and I startled each other once on a rainy day coming around a curve on a trail. He just scampered away when he saw me but it did get me thinking. Such beautiful creatures, wish I felt more comfortable observing them.

[Harker]

4. Many animals humble mankind...

or should, anyhow. A good humbling can aid one in keeping a sound perspective.

[Mendocino]

5. Doug Peacock was the inspiration

for George Hayduke in The Monkey Wrench Gang by Edward Abbey. It can be said that Abbey himself and Kenneth Sleight (Seldom Seen Smith) were also portrayed by the TMWG story.