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my name is Steve crusher I live
approximately 30 miles north of Haines
Alaska at the crucial Wildlife Center I
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am a naturalist I guess if you wanted to
define what I do I've been working with
wild animals my whole life since I was
like an or as I can remember I lived in
a big beautiful farm in northern
Minnesota with my grandparents and my
mom and dad and the constant office was
like The Waltons there and my parents
were bringing orphan animals from Alaska
and northern Canada so I always was
around wild animals right from the very
beginning I don't know what normal life
is like without you know a wild animal
following me or on me or I'm chasing
Anton or the animals that I work with
here are part of our family they have
names and the only detention just like a
little child they show their emotions to
me they give me their true selves all
the time and this is a team effort
this place is it all works because
everybody knows just intuitively what
role they need to play to help and we're
all trying to help each other and
somehow someway it's always worth Rocky
is Rocky's omnipresence he's everywhere
and I couldn't run this without rocky
heck he helped me build this cabin he
helped me build the fences he also has a
wonderful relationship with the grizzly
bear and the Ranger and the moose and he
has a very soft approach he's he doesn't
come across an a formidable way to these
animals and they love it
I accidentally ran into rocky when I
first moved here so long ago and he was
I guess you could say he was sort of
homeless you have to have some food
banana and peanut butter dessert just
just sit down and the foodie was eating
he's eating beans out of a can every
time I saw him so I thought now hey
Rocky
do you want a place to sleep do you want
some decent food and since that time
everything just changed for both of us
Garrett my son he has a amazing rapport
with some of these animals here he has
my back always when I'm doing something
and I forget he's there to help
he loves to prepare the food here he
makes meals he makes me Blackjacks in
the morning he has a garden here he does
a lot of things that I sometimes
overlook what keeps me up at night is
what kind of a future he has if society
as a whole continues on this path of
self-destruction in my opinion it's not
sustainable how we're living there's
only so many people that are going to be
interested in looking at a grizzly bear
or a Wolverine or some other wild animal
and be in a log cabin right so because
of a naturalist and on the filmmaker too
I'm trying to always think of ways in
which we can connect other people that
live in a different type of lifestyle to
realize that we all are part of nature
how do you do that well I make films
about health and ways to treat chronic
disease and cancer even
take those subjects and I live it myself
so an accuser everyday out of organic
vegetables carrots apples and juice them
and I drink that and I also run around
barefoot a lot of the time here because
I'm connected to the earth and there's
an earth energy that really heals
chronic inflammation in people so for me
I don't want to just exist
there's 7.3 billion people on this
planet I just don't want to be a
consumer if I'm gonna live and breathe
air and drink the water and eat food and
just be here on this planet walking
around I want to make a difference I
want to make something of my life that's
what I've tried to live by when I see
people walk away from here at the end of
the programs they're invigorated they're
given hope and it's also a little bit
tinged with a little sadness and a
little bit of emotion perhaps because
for some people it hits them a little
harder they see that life isn't quite as
simple as maybe they see it here and
that there isn't these these problems
that we have don't really have easy
answers there's a complexity but we
bring hope to them I think the future
rests in one word love
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