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This was a beautiful experience.  I feel changed fundamentally, and I am not sure how or when this occurred.  It feels like an unfolding or a softening with each experience being with wild animals.  Pimpernel, the coyote, the talkative Mr. Goose, Teton Totem and Mr. Pinkerton and Windwalker all helped me unpack my preconceptions and fears about being present with wild animals, and I feel like this has enriched my life and the way of being in the world in ways I can’t predict.  Suffice it to say the experience at Earthfire is still unfolding within me.

Learn from animals.  Take care of the earth.  We are all one.

Earthfire provides a unique place to gain an understanding of the individual nature of animals and what exceptional spirits they can be.

Everyone at Earthfire, human animal and wild animal, have provided such a beautiful and wonderful journey!  Congratulations and thank you!  Even the food was great.

Thanks to everyone who participated and helped put this event on; Penelope Smith for the retreat, Miso Hungry for the food, Anthony Birkholz for filming, Jean Simpson for the animal handling.

Watch as participants of Earthfire Institutes digital storytelling workshop go from technological panic or storytellers block to completing a passionately felt creative piece in two days. These stories are beautifully told in their own voice with Earthfire’s animals and the experience of meeting them as inspiration. For more information on this years Digital Storytelling Workshop led by Leslie Rule of KQED San Francisco visit our calendar.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Fortunately for us, Windsong is so gentle that Cucumber, who long ago decided she was to be a permanent fixture in the cabin, has accepted her presence (after a few dominating growling sessions to assert her place and superiority). This is quite a statement of not only her age but also the softness she has always projected. It was this combination of age and innate gentleness that made us decide to invite Windsong to host our very first parent-child retreat in the yurt, lending her wolf magic and energy to the event.   On a splendid winter day in January, three sets of parents and their children visited the coyotes and foxes and badger and wolves and buffalo and wild burros. When finished we all entered the warmth of the yurt for hot chocolate, homemade animal cookies  and storytelling around the wood-burning stove.  Then we brought in Windsong and the kids were electrified. Tentatively at first they came over, their parents with camera in hand as the children made her acquaintance. Soon she was surrounded by kids, covered by little hands as she stood there patiently allowing them to feel her, explore her. Two mothers, watching this, were crying. It was quite something.

For information on our family retreats this summer, visit our calendar.

On September 18th the Earthfire Institute hosted a group of international delegates from non-governmental organizations (NGOs). For the second year in a row Jackson-based Wyoming Global Leadership Exchange (WGLE) called upon Earthfire to share their experience and insight with international leaders of NGOs looking to use Teton Valley non-profits as models for their own organizations.

The Bangladeshi group was composed of four NGO executive directors, a program director, and two translators. The delegation arrived at Earthfire Institute to witness examples of “how non-profits work to protect our natural resources,” said Nicole Prater, Executive Director of WGLE. Though visitors to non-profits are often allowed to view office environments and see power-point presentations, a visit to Earthfire is to go beyond simply meeting in a boardroom. To come to Earthfire, is not to hear how and what is being done, but instead to experience it for yourself.  This, according to Prater made it “a highlight of the group’s trip.”

Rather than hosting a large numbers of visitors, Earthfire’s goal is to work with small groups of influential people, who in turn influence others to act on behalf of wildlife and the environment.  After a short introduction, Dr. Eirich, founder and executive director of the Earthfire invited the group from Bangladesh to meet a few of the animal ambassadors.

The opportunity to enter a two-acre enclosed Wildlife Garden and meet wild animals was both exciting and a little bit unsettling.  Several members of the group chose to enter, while some at first opted to watch from outside the enclosed garden.

Major Bear, one of the black bears at Earthfire, was the first to meet the group.  Under the careful supervision of animal trainer Jean Simpson, each guest had the opportunity to greet and spend time with him.  As members of the group witnessed Major Bear up close, the nervous tension associated with an unfamiliarity of wild creatures began to dissipate.  Soft chatter filled the air, people began taking pictures and some of the guests that were initially afraid to enter the garden, decided to step through the gate.

Next, three wolves entered the Wildlife Garden and Dr. Eirich shared the story of wolves in the American West. As Apricot, Moonlight and Moonlit, splashed in a creek, swam in a pool and chased each other around the garden, the group learned about the critical role wolves play in Yellowstone ecology and the success of wolf reintroduction into the national park.

Earthfire’s vision is to create a bridge that connects humans with the natural world through the voices of rescued native wildlife under its care, bringing us the joy of interspecies understanding and giving us the will to protect wildlife for future generations.

“I was astonished to see people so conscious of disabled animals when so many people in this world don’t even know about the plight of disabled people.”

The effect of Earthfire’s vision hit home with the foreign group. Kaniz Fatema, Executive Director of Annanah Sangstha – an organization dedicated toward improving the lives of the underprivileged – turned to Dr. Eirich nearly in tears and said she would like to establish a place like Earthfire Institute in Bangladesh and would “share this thought of creating a similar facility with your professional counterparts in my country of Bangladesh.”

This opportunity was organized by the Wyoming Global Leadership Exchange, Jackson, Wyoming and sponsored by the International Visitor Leadership Program of the U.S. Department of State’s Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs.