Home for Animals

Wednesday, July 14, 2010

By Matthew Irwin

“First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win.”
- Gandhi

Jackson Hole, Wyo.-I first visited Earthfire Institute by invitation in late fall 2009. A friend of mine who volunteers at the wildlife sanctuary suggested me for an upcoming workshop, saying that I would be sympathetic to the institute's mission.

When the executive director, Susan Eirich, called to get to know me a little better before extending the official invitation, she said, “The most important thing is that you have to love animals.”

Over the next year, Eirich asked me to make other similar assurances. She and her partner, Jean (as in the French “John,” not the English “Gene”) Simpson, have been wary about who visits the property, having faced various criticisms since its founding in Teton Valley, Idaho in 2000.

Some hunting outfitters and ranchers in the region, Eirich said, say the animals should be killed. Some animal rights advocates say the animals shouldn't be in pens, and the at-large public has also demonstrated some skepticism, she said, about an organization that wants humans to see animals as equals.

Though they have the permits, the accounting and the authoritative opinions to legitimize Earthfire's efforts, Eirich has been hesitant about doing a story with JH Weekly, afraid it would rouse and antagonize detractors.

However, Eirich, 59, and Simpson, 62, say over the last 10 years they've struggled to create the sanctuary and eduction center they've had in mind, while meeting the daily needs of the animals and the land. With plans to create four “wildlife gardens” only a quarter finished and an $18,000-a-month operating cost that mainly covers maintenance, medicine and fodder but also includes administrative staff and fundraising efforts, Eirich said they need to reach out to a wider circle of advisors, donors and supporters.

In the immediate future, she's hoping for a better turnout for the Tin Cup Challenge, which ends Saturday. Teton Valley’s version of Old Bill’s Fun Run fills a large hole in Earthfire's budget.


Sharing territory
On 40 acres in Tetonia, Earthfire sits on a former cattle ranch, part of at least 300 acres originally homesteaded by James T. Beard and his son, Joe, in the early 1900s.

More than 60 wild animals rescued from fur farms and from destruction by public land officials now live on the property. They include 19 wolves, five coyotes, three foxes, six bears, two lynx, a bobcat, a cougar and a bison. The institute’s badger, Miss Clover, recently died at 13 years old. The average age for a badger in the wild, Eirich said, is six years.

Earthfire is not a zoo. Rather, Eirich invites individuals and small groups to the sanctuary to demonstrate that humans can coexist with wild animals.
Acquisition of the land culminated a nearly decade-long relationship between Eirich and Simpson that began on New Year's Eve 1990, when Eirich, who owned a half-wolf, went to meet the man who had worked as consultant and trainer on the movie White Fang, for instance.

Eirich and a friend showed up unannounced at his cabin outside Heber City, Utah with a bottle of champagne, and the two bonded over their love of wolves.
“Together, we felt, we could create a place to protect some of the beautiful creatures most in need of our help,” Eirich writes on the institute’s Web site, Earthfireinstitute.org.

While Eirich worked as a psychologist at the Colorado state penitentiary, Simpson went looking for a place to build their dream. He drove through Victor, Idaho on his way to  Montana, and called Eirich to tell her that he’d found the place.
“The land spoke to us,” Eirich said.

In 1998, they bought a parcelfrom Joe Beard’s grandson, Lyle, for $250,000, Simpson said, by cashing in all they owned and taking out a bank loan for the rest.
During the first couple years, neighbors exhausted appeals with the county to prevent the couple from getting their land permits. And not only were they shot at, but their dog died after a bullet pierced its heart.

Eventually, they won the permits, as well as several operating permits which they have to renew yearly with the U.S. Department of Agriculture, Idaho Department of Fish and Game and U.S. Fish and Wildlife, according to a 2005 Casper Star-Tribune article.

They named the institute Earthfire, after a female wolf who they said is an “Earth mother” with a fire in her belly to nurse other animals. The wolf died just a few years ago at 14.

Shortly after the couple achieved nonprofit status in 2000, they also received a $10,000 grant from the Burton Foundation in Utah, which they put towards building their first wildlife garden. “That quality of support has made a huge difference in our ability to move on,” Eirich said.

'Airy-fairy' and animal activists
Before I had heard of the institute, a former JH Weekly reporter had described it to me unfavorably, essentially calling staff and volunteers a bunch of new age nutjobs who want to frolic with and hug wild animals.

This perception is familiar to Eirich, who shies from talking about what she calls Earthfire’s “airy-fairy” sessions, as when they brought in a healer, who donated her time to treat a wolf, named Apricot, with a neurological deformation. A video of the sessions can be seen at Earthfire.org. Eirich told me that as a biologist, she didn’t jump on the idea of healing energy, but “if it happens it happens.”

Healthcare institutions across the country don't disagree. Before I moved back to Wyoming, for instance, I worked for a hospital system that used both “healing touch” and “therapy dogs” to make patients feel better. And Viktor Reinhardt, who co-wrote The Magic of Touch: Healing Effects of Animal Touch and Animal Presence with his wife, Annie, said in an email, “I would conclude from our studies that touch does not "heal" the recipient from a pathological health problem, but it certainly has a calming, relaxing and reassuring effect, which promotes psychological well-being and physical health; so yes, you could say that touch can indirectly heal a diseased subject.??

Eirich said that if we’re willing to entertain the possibility that animal presence can heal humans, then we should allow that our energies have the potential to heal them.

DJ Shubert, a wildlife biologist at the Animal Welfare Institute in Washington D.C. told me that it seems obvious to him that the affection humans share with each other should be extended to wild animals.
“More scientists are starting to understand and appreciate that what we used to think of as a divide through animals and human animals is not a great chasm,” he said.

Shubert worked at a sanctuary primarily for rescued burros and horses in Texas for three years before he joined AWI. I had called him for an expert opinion on one of the more touchy subjects at Earthfire: While a perceived threat against their way of life makes ranchers’ and outfitters’ point-of-view somewhat understandable, harder to grasp are animal rights activists who say that, by keeping the animals in cages, Earthfire doesn’t look out for their welfare.

Having only visited Earthfire’s Web site and spoken to me, Shubert believes the institute is heading in the right direction.

“The reality of the sanctuary-type environment is that bears, tigers, coyotes have to live in pens,” he said. “As long [as Earthfire is] dedicating funds into making things better for the animals – even if the funding is not quite there for the next larger pen or garden, if they are cared for in terms of food, as well as psychological enrichment, I would say that they’re certainly on the right track.”
Plans for the wildlife gardens and a map of the sanctuary can be seen at Earthfire.org/sanctuary/map.

What gets paid
Animal care is the institute’s largest expense. Simpson and Eirich live in an unfinished cabin with a concrete floor and no hot water. They drive a 1992 Toyota pickup. Neither takes a salary, and though a few salaried employees provide maintenance and office work, the institute is supported by countless volunteers, who not only work on-site, but also host retreats and technical support in-kind. A marketing professional named Sherri Pittman recently gave them a $25,000 vision statement for free, Eirich said.

Eirich also paid for their retreat yurt out of her retirement savings because she didn’t want to wait any longer, she said.
“It’s a constant balancing act, about what gets paid,” Simpson said. “One thing that never gets shortchanged is animal care.”

The Tin Cup Challenge earned Earthfire about $61,000 last year, and this year, Eirich hopes to at least reach the matching funds limit of $25,000, but it’s not looking so good according to the online donation tracker at www.cftetonvalley.org.
“The Tin Cup is essential to us,” Eirich said. “It is a major source of our operating income, without which we wouldn't be able to exist. Special grants for animals’ houses or programs are really wonderful, but the animals have to eat as well.”

Daily routine
Eirich and Simpson start their day around 6 a.m. with meditation. Then Simpson goes out to check on all the animals, make sure they have food, meds, affection.  Eirich goes into a staff meeting, and begins working on fundraising and other office chores, including updating the Web site and posting to the blog.  She’d like to spend more time with the animals.

“My main job is to think through what we can teach … that sounds too arrogant … what we can learn here that we can share with the world,” Eirich said. “That’s the focus of my day.”

Simpson spends his day doing maintenance, making repairs. Every day, he also rotates the animals in the wildlife garden. He’s eager to get the other three gardens built, so that more animals can be out at once.
Their day ends around 10:30 p.m., though it can go longer, Simpson said, especially if they have a sick animal.

If they get any time off, they ride their horses, but they’ve only logged about three hours so far this year, Eirich said.

“Yes I get frustrated and impatient,” Eirich said. “I spend time getting meat for the animals, working with printers, paying electricity … instead of building these projects [such as the wildlife gardens and retreats]. But neither of us would dream of doing something else.”

Welcoming visitors
According to advisory board member Anthony Birkholz, Eirich and Simpson have been inching forward all their plans simultaneously over the last 10 years, a balancing act that in part explains the caution with which they’ve extended invitations. If they direct attention too much in one direction – say, to defending themselves against attacks – they’ll lose ground elsewhere, he said.
“If they hadn’t been so protective, [Earthfire] probably wouldn’t be there,” Birkholz said.

Nonetheless, Birkholz and other advisors have encouraged them to accept more help, he said, and they have opened up quite a bit.
Earthfire’s outreach effort included a rebuilding of its Web site for 2009, through a grant program with Free Range Studios, which did the Inconvenient Truth and The Story of Stuff Web sites.

And in addition to the individuals the sanctuary has reached out to, Eirich wants to expand its retreats to include environmentalists, business leaders, community planners, educators, artists and spiritual leaders, such as Buddhist Rinpoches, who have “a commitment and capability for wildlife advocacy,” according to a fundraising document.

A new program with local guide Kathy Shill and Connect Retreats will bring small groups into the sanctuary for discussion and interaction with the animals before heading into the wilderness.

What Earthfire has to share
I received an invitation to the sanctuary through Birkholtz just shy of a year ago, when he asked me if I’d be interested in a digital storytelling workshop.
On my first visit, I walked with two wolves in the wildlife garden. I signed a release, of course, and Eirich instructed me to always face the wolves; otherwise, they might nip me in the ass. If they got too close for my comfort, I should alpha-dog them by stepping in and speaking firmly.

I have since been to the institute a number of times, had my knuckles nibbled by a fox and have fed a bear.

My experience with a coyote, named Streak, showed me what Eirich means when she says that we have something to learn from the animals at Earthfire.
“They teach us about themselves,” she said.

That is, each animal is an individual, the way that humans are individuals whose behaviors depend on a combination of genes, environment, and group dynamics, as well as “the spark,” Eirich calls it, that makes all individuals unique from birth.
“It’s not instantaneous for everyone to understand what they’re trying to do,” Birkholz said.

Having first visited Earthfire in March 2009, Birkholz now donates large blocks of his time to create video content for the institute.

“Their mission coincides with mine,” he said. “To evolve myself, to reconnect with nature and help others do the same thing. We are not separate from nature.”
Shubert at AWI said that to the extent that Earthfire can influence public policy and public perception of wildlife, he believes its work is “immensely important.”
“Everything we learn suggests that animals are individuals,” he said. “They do suffer, they do maintain family bonds.”

Wildlife and public land agencies, Shubert said, need to consider that the number of wolves on a landscape is not just about the number, but the relationships within a single pack and between packs.

Simpson and Eirich add that good land management isn’t about separating animals from humans, but about sharing an environment, beginning by destroying the notion of “us versus them.”

“All beings are part of the community,” Eirich said. “A community is not just streets and houses and a community center. It’s also the trees, the insects and the animals. Changing the attitude is changing the action.” JHW


Photos courtesy of Earthfire Institute
Grizzly


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