A new perspective on nature that just might save us all

SEELEY LAKE - Doug Chadwick will be presenting his new book at the Open Book Club at the Seeley Lake Community Foundation on Saturday, Jan. 15 at 2 p.m. Masks are required. Please note the earlier start time so people attending can drive in the daylight. The event will also be live streamed on Alpine Artisans' Facebook page. 

Chadwick is a writer well known to many in this corner of the Rocky Mountains or as we like to say, the South West Crown of the Continent. His notable books and many essays have provided up front and personal accounts of some of the wildest places and most charismatic creatures that inhabit this region. Mountain goats ("A Beast the Color of Winter"), wolverines ("The Wolverine Way") and grizzlies are among his and our favorite subjects. But, for years he has made a career exploring the world while writing for National Geographic, Patagonia Inc. and others, documenting the natural history and plight of many other high profile species and environments.

His latest book "Four Fifths a Grizzly" seems to promise, in title at least, more of this fare. This book, however, is a collection of essays that, taken together, tells a very, very different story.

It is a story of kinship and evolution featuring bacteria, protists, viruses and other forms of life (or near life) that make our own lives possible and link us to every other organism that ever existed. You and I are not just linked to the natural world through commonly touted ecological connections and services (like clean water, air and food); we are the natural world. Our bodies contain and depend on more microbial cells (like the many forms of bacteria) than cells that can be recognized as purely human. We contain and depend on DNA from ancient microbes and viruses that have been incorporated into plant and animal cells through eons of evolution. We share much of our DNA, the instructions that build and operate our bodies, with every other organism on the planet. In the case of grizzlies that is at least 80% (four-fifths from the title) and probably more like 90%.

Chadwick's hope is that if we understand just how inextricably we are tied to every other organism on the planet, we will do what is necessary to conserve the biological and ecological systems that support it and us. Not just because it is incomprehensibly beautiful and keeps us alive but because it is us.

If you want a story of adventure and exploration with charismatic animals or stunning landscapes as the focus, check out any of Chadwick's earlier essays and books. If you want to know more about what you're made of and who your extended family is, check out his latest book.