Bear With Me in the Utne Reader
The Spine of the Continent: Protecting Grizzly Bears
The Spine of the Continent is a landscape conservation initiative named for the entire Rocky Mountain expanse from the Yukon down through Mexico. Grizzly bears are a key species in this area.
By Mary Ellen Hannibal, February 2013
As climate change encroaches, animals and plants around the globe are having their habitats pulled out from under them. At the same time, human development has made islands out of even our largest nature reserves, stranding the biodiversity that lives within them. The Spine of the Continent (Lyons Press, 2012) introduces readers to the most ambitious conservation effort ever undertaken: to create linked protected areas extending from the Yukon to Mexico, the entire length of North America. Learn about the significance of grizzly bears in indigenous culture and why they must be protected in this excerpt from Chapter 1, “Bear with Me”
