On a Happier Note

[kayshapero]

Proof positive there is a use for daytime television - awhile back I was sitting in the waiting room at the local Saturn dealership waiting for my car to be serviced, and the TV was turned on to a talk show in which the host was interviewing a man about his experience with bears. This being actually interesting, I watched the show instead of turning the thing off (my usual reaction when nobody else is in the room anyway), and made a note of the title of a book written by the interviewee, then requested it from the library.

I've just finished reading Among the Bears: Raising Orphan Cubs in the Wild by Benjamin Kilham (The link leads to an excerpt from the book posted on the Written Voices Radio website.) Gunsmith/sugar maple farmer Ben Kilham, already a licensed and experienced wildlife rehabilitator was handed a new challenge in 1993, a pair of orphaned bear cubs. Wishing them to grow up to be wild bears, not exhibits, he decided to try and raise them as much as possible in the way a mother bear would do so, in the woods. This book tells some of what happened thereafter, and in future years with other cubs, both orphans adopted by him, and the offspring of one of those cubs, grown and living wild on her own. In the process of observing and interacting with bears in the wild, he learned a fascinating amount of things about bears and bear society, much in the way (and with the same groundbreaking effect) that Jane Goodall did with chimpanzees, or Dian Fossey with gorillas. I cannot recommend this book highly enough.