Living with Bears
Charlie has built himself a wooden cabin in the Yentna River Valley that is his summer home in the Alaskan wilderness far from the nearest road or any other public utilities. He lives there for around 6 months per year without a phone or radio to keep him in touch with the 'outside world'. He commutes to and from his winter home in Anchorage in a small, single engine plane.
He has been doing his 'bear commute' for nearly the last two decades.
Charlie, now 69 years old appears to be disillusioned with modern life, preferring instead to live alongside the grizzly and brown bears who he regularly feeds. He says, "I think I'm doing what most people try to do - something that turns them on, gets you away from the everyday humdrum of our existence (and) I've just taken it over the edge. I find this to be exhilarating. For six months I don't know what's going on in the world, but I like that. Every year as I get older I feel more depressed, seeing what a mess the world's in. They (the bears) have a way of looking at me that makes me wonder if all men couldn't get along with bears if they could just have a chance to spend some time with them". (The Sun, Emma Cox, Published: 20 Dec 2007).
I get the impression that Charlie reluctantly agreed to be filmed. I can find no information regarding the conception of this documentary nor can I ascertain if Charlie himself profited from the making of it.
British documentary filmmaker Jon Alwen spent 51 days with Vandergaw at his farm during the summer of 2006 which resulted in the making of this one hour long documentary.
Alwen witnessed a couple of nasty close shaves even in the short time that he spent filming him last summer. (Anchorage Daily News, Craig Medred, Published: January 18th, 2008).
From my watching of this documentary I was initially struck by the way Charlie walks; he appears to walk and move around a bit like a bear himself. He moves and talks slowly and deliberately.
I note also that Charlie always walks with a stick in his hand. I too always have a stick or two (for various reasons) when walking through the bush. A stick can have various uses; it does scare snakes who appear to think that you are just way too wide for them to mess with or eat, and it is also useful for chook herding. And in our hot Australian summers a stick with some foliage on is good for keeping flies at bay and for a bit of fanning or hill climbing or descending. Thankfully I doubt that I will ever have to try controlling or interacting with a wild bear.
I am somewhat disturbed by Charlie's bear feeding behavior and wondered what proportion of the bears daily food intake is supplied by him and I worried about whether the bears could become dependent on him. Also I noticed that many bears would congregate at Charlie's 'Bear Haven' and wondered how Charlie's behavior may be inadvertently interrupting the bears' established social and breeding habits.
Charlie also has an electric fence around his cabin should he ever feel the need to activate it for the protection of himself or his visitors.
I read that Charlie feeds them processed dog-food; this, to me does not sound to be a very desirable nutritional supplement to the bears' diet.
"There's a law against feeding bears for a very good reason, and that is to protect people and to protect bears,'' said Doug Larsen, director of the Wildlife Conservation Division in the Alaska Department of Fish and Game. "This is clearly a violation of that law."(Anchorage Daily News, Craig Medred, Published: January 18th, 2008).
Charlie has been vehemently defended by one of his daughters who claims that she spent part of her childhood at her father's bear farm that his grandchildren have also visited and Gryphen, an Internet blogger and former Dimond High School student claims respect for his former science teacher and wrestling coach though he also states that he remains agnostic in regards to the morality of Charlie's Vandergaw's all consuming hobby.
Humans do often seem to have a great propensity to seek thrills by interacting with wild animals, often attempting to 'tame' them. Testimony to this fact is the life and unfortunate fate of Timothy Treadwell who spent 13 years living amongst the bears and who was, along with his girlfriend subsequently killed by them. Despite Timothy's avowed allegiance to bears and preservation of their habitat 2 bears were killed by searchers investigating his disappearance.
From my reading of bear behavior they seem to be naturally curious and in my research for this article I came across many photos of black, brown and grizzly bears meandering through the highways, parks and household gardens of suburban Alaska. There seemed to be a particular concentration of bears being photographed beside upturned household rubbish bins.
Indigenous peoples have lived alongside animals in ecological harmony and indeed the nature of wild animals is often incorporated into their stories, legends, songs, dances and other important cultural events that contribute to the knowledge base of Indigenous Peoples. The mimicking of certain behavioral characteristics of wild animals is often encouraged, developed and incorporated into cultural events such as dances and Totemic behavior often plays an important part in the shaping of individual personalities and collective culture.
Indigenous people I know are often so good at mimicking wild animal behavior that they can even confuse and control them. Some hunters using mimicking stances can cause the hunted animals to 'freeze' making them easier to catch. I daresay that Charlie has learned to walk and move about in a way that minimizes his chances of being attacked or otherwise rejected by the bears.
Indeed one of the main differences of 'camping out' with indigenous people is that wild animals tend not always to hide themselves from view and very often may interact in some way with people. I've met more than a few friendly emus, kangaroos and lizards out in the bush who impart to me some kind of spiritual wisdom. An important distinction that needs to be made here is that Indigenous people never try to tame a wild animal.
Indigenous stories often talk of the abilities and advantages of humans adopting animal-like properties rather than the more western view which anthropomorphizes both wild and tamed animals and this skewed view of things axiomatically assumes that man can control any wild beast by forcing it to mould in a way that renders human control whereas the Indigenous view emphasizes an ability for both to live alongside each other without being disrespectful towards each other.
I went researching to see what insights I might be able to find about living alongside these wild bears. I came across an American Indian Legend about a bear who marries a woman. I read a story recanted by a tribe member of the Nez Perce tribe (http://www.pitt.edu/~dash/animalindian.html#sahaptinbear August 13th 2008) though I must admit I found it confusing. It seemed to me that perhaps Indian experiences since 'invasion' may have been superimposed onto an original legend.
However what I got from it is that bears may have a penchant for socializing with food providing humans and that whilst an ongoing dependency type of liaison is possible it is fraught with dangers that can be highly likely counterproductive for both bear and human.
I perused and read a couple of other Indian legends too but must admit that I didn't feel I could understand or interpret them with any degree of cultural accuracy. Perhaps another AC content producer might want to enlighten me.
In 1926, anthropologist A. Irving Hallowell studied bear ceremonialism throughout Europe, Asia and North America and noted that widely divergent cultures shared linguistic taboos in referring to bears, hunted them with spears or axes even when guns were available, honored their carcasses with decorations and speeches, observed similar restrictions on the eating of bear meat, and kept bear bones from other animals (http://www.bearshaman.com/bearmedicine.html August 14th 2008).
I read also that the bear is the keeper of the dream time, and stores the teachings of dreams until the dreamer wakes up to them (http://www.birdclan.org/bear.html August 14th 2008).Here in Australia the serpent (or snake) takes on this liminal quality of being able to mediate and travel easily between the waking and dreaming worlds of the 'djurrkrupa' dreamtime. I have provided here a photo taken last summer of the snake who lived in the tree immediately adjacent to my bedroom.
It seems there can be found many accounts of people living alongside bears and I have provided some of the links I found at the end of this article and even Vandergaw himself, when pressed seems ambiguous about his involvement with them, admitting that his relationship with them may reflect some kind of emotional sickness he has. His behavior amongst them might not be quite as provocative as that of the late Timothy Treadwell as, as Charlie Vandergaw himself puts it, "I try hard not to invade their space" (http://larwilife.blogspot.com/2008/01/man-who-lives-with-bears-having.html 13th August 2008).
Journalist Craig Medred of the Anchorage Daily News seems to have interviewed Charlie on a number of occasions. For a good insight into the personality of Charlie you can read this article written by Craig on April 15th 2007.
It appears that the reasons some men and women choose to socialize with, or live alongside bears is as varied as those people are themselves. All of their stories attest to the curious and adventurous nature of bears.
And as an aside i think that perhaps Charlie Vandergaw might be wise to invest in a satellite phone and/or Internet service because even if the bears don't get him old age could and I wonder if the cannabilistic nature of his bear 'friends might express an inward desire for him to completely disappear from view of the outside world.
Keep posted.
Published by Jaahda Jinnah
Jaahda Jinnah is a wise old crone who knows much about all sorts of things. Try me ! View profile
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Post a CommentFascinating.