Smiling Bears A Zookeeper Explores the Behaviour and Emotional Life of Bears

by Poulsen, Else; Herrero, Stephen

• ISBN13: 9781553653875
• ISBN10: 1553653874
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2009-05-05
• Publisher: Greystone Books

Summary

A zookeeper's extraordinary relationship with the bears she has rehabilitated and her insights into their behavior and emotional lives. Few people know bears as intimately as Else Poulsen. She has raised bears, comforted bears, taught bears, learned from bears, had bears communicate their needs to her, and nursed bears back to health. This remarkable book reveals the many insights about bears and their lives that she has gained through her work with them. In the eighties, Poulsen became a zookeeper in Calgary, where she rehabilitated bears in crisis. She has shared in the joy of a polar bear discovering soil under her paws for the first time in twenty years, felt the pride of a cub learning to crack nuts with her molars, and grieved at the horror of captivity for Asian black bears in China. Smiling Bearsprovides an enlightening and moving portrait of bears in all their richness and complexity and of Poulsen's exhilarating work with them.

Table of Contents

Foreword	p. IX
Acknowledgments	p. XV
Prologue: Who Are You and What Can I Do for You?	p. XVII
Smiling Bears: Bears Do Things for Bear Reasons	p. 3
Three Rocky Mountain Grizzlies: From the Wild to Captivity	p. 21
Sex and the Single Grizzly: Skoki Moves In	p. 43
A Pacing Polar Bear: Snowball's Inner Demon	p. 64
Polar Bear on Prozac: Snowball Gets Her Life Back	p. 84
Conversations with a Polar Bear: Misty Asks for Stuff	p. 102
Being a Spectacled Bear: Melanka and Nicholas	p. 123
Raising Miggy-Raising Me: Learning Lessons from a Cub	p. 146
Rehabilitating Barle: From Circus Bear to Polar Bear	p. 169
Barle, Triton, and Talini: Rehabilitation Comes Full Circle	p. 184
Epilogue: What Bears Need-You and Me	p. 199
Notes	p. 215
Appendix	p. 223
Index	p. 230
Table of Contents provided by Ingram. All Rights Reserved.