Ina Pace
Local Journalism Initiative Reporter
The Squamish Chief
A new Indigenous wildlife docuseries is due to launch Jan. 8, encompassing a two eyed seeing approach.
The show has been filmed nationwide, and includes an episode featuring Squamish.
“Animal Nation” has been created by 2Ducks Media in collaboration with Indigenous communities across Canada and the U.S. to include “missing voices.”
These voices are Indigenous perspectives from various Indigenous communities nationwide, who tell stories about their cultural connection to animals, and their unique environmental conservation initiatives, with generational knowledge.
Such values of cultural stewardship are shown to be synergized with Western science throughout the series, as the crew are granted privileged access to traditional ways of knowing.
Working with “a little more than a million dollars,” the seven-part series will feature the bear, beaver, bison, caribou, eagle, salmon, and the wolf. The salmon episode specifically (airing Jan. 29) was partly filmed in Squamish, and also in Labrador.
Each episode is an hour long, and each is dedicated to the significance of one animal at a time.
According to Ojibway producer Jesse Bochner, the entire production since its conception took around three and a half years to make, with overlapping seasons, and different crews.
Each episode, he said, is made up of a primary story, interjected with a “more self-contained” secondary story.
In the salmon episode for example, the crew approached the Sḵwx̱wú7mesh Úxwumixw (Squamish Nation) community members collecting the row and salmon to ask about why and how they do so, from a cultural perspective. The scenes then jump to Labrador, where different Indigenous communities are spoken with about the monitoring of salmon spawn. The film then cuts back to B.C. when the seasons have changed, and the salmon are due to be released again.
Bochner considered B.C. a “star of the show” because of its climate and accessibility.
“Animal Nation” is the “flagship project” created and produced by Bochner (who also directed a couple of episodes), alongside Moroccan-born producer and director of photography Ari A. Cohen.
“Wildlife films often ignore Indigenous and local knowledge—and that knowledge is the key to moving forward on a better path,” Cohen said, in a news release.
The production consisted of a team of Indigenous creatives, with actor Tantoo Cardinal as narrator, the latter of whom described having “a real relationship with the wind, birds and environment,” in the release.
“It’s in my blood to be a part of speaking for the animals, and the relationship we have with the world,” Cardinal said.
Bochner, originally from Roseau River in Manitoba, is a “scoop kid,” who grew up in Montreal, and worked in graphic design in Toronto, before moving back to Montreal to pursue video editing.
With a passion for accomplishing “odd, esoteric, sort of unreasonable little projects,” he said it takes “the right kind of maniac to want to be cold and wet for 20 hours a day.”
The Squamish Chief spoke with Bochner about the practicalities and inspiration behind the show’s production and development.
What follows is a version of that conversation edited for length and clarity.
The Squamish Chief: What has been your prime motive in creating a docuseries with a two eyed seeing approach?
Jesse Bochner: [Indigenous knowledge] is an incredible source of information that has often been overlooked in scientific conservation, in regards to these animals. A lot of that Indigenous knowledge isn’t coming from a Eurocentric scientific point of view: it’s more cultural or experiential; it doesn’t get labeled as hard science, and so it hasn’t been part of the conversation.
A big driving force behind the project was to include lessons we could learn, from watching the bear dance, to land and resource management from beavers. We want to include these missing voices, and talk about boots-on-the-ground activities.
SC: In what ways does the inclusion of Indigenous perspectives complement that of Western science?
JB: The missing Indigenous voices are the primary source of the storytelling, because that’s where our community members, experts, and knowledge keepers are, but that’s building upon existing stuff. It has to be the combination of the old and the new, and then gluing them together to build something that we never thought of before.
The world is a big place; there are a lot of problems going on, and we’ve all got to work together to take the best pieces of everything, to build and preserve and inspire the next generation.
Climate change is not going to fix itself by next week. We’ve got to find a way to evolve our knowledge in an ever changing world. It’s a great thing that Indigenousness is becoming more a part of the popular Zeitgeist and understanding, but we don’t want to be trapped in amber. This is about a new way of seeing.
SC: How are you finding a focus, and balancing both perspectives, in this ever-changing world?
JB: In regards to dealing with climate change, there’s so much doom and gloom happening that we want to inject at least some positivity.
These communities are doing a whole wide range of projects. Sometimes it’s just one or two people, or sometimes it’s the entire community doing something in regards to conservation and preservation of the animals of the land.
For example, in B.C., there’s this community in the Okanagan who, at one point in the year, collect all the spawning salmon, fertilize the eggs, and raise the small fry over the winter. In summer, they re-release the salmon back into the watershed. There’s singing and prayer, and there’s a salmon cannon; they fire a huge stream of 10,000 salmon.
Also, they reintegrate new bison from one community to another to increase the herd; as a keystone animal, its grazing manages the erosion of the land, and its poop fertilizes the land. The bugs, the worms, and the birds use their fur for their nests, and so bringing back these animals has a disproportionate positive impact on the land.
That’s the type of approach; where we look at the animal, but from a couple of different perspectives. Sometimes we lean into the culture a bit more. Sometimes we lean into the scientific conservation aspect a bit more. But we try to get something that’s not just, you know, ‘beaver teeth are one inch long,’ or whatever.
SC: How did you decide where and when to film, whilst keeping both the crew and communities, as well as the animals, respected and safe?
JB: Because it’s a nature show, it’s dependent on the animals. We look at when bears are coming out of hibernation, and when fish are spawning.
Even when you have a very organized schedule, the weather changes. If there’s too much rain or not enough rain, that makes it harder to even find the critters in the first place. As much as we like David Attenborough, we don’t have quite as big a budget, so we can’t spend six months in the field hoping that, you know, the bear is going to poke his nose out of the cave when we need it.
Part of it is just practicality: who is available and when. And of course, we would love to go everywhere, but getting to the Northwest Territories is not always an easy thing to do.
Regarding safety, distance is an important thing. In this case, we’re dealing with animals like grizzly bears. On a practical level as a human, you don’t want to get too close to the animal, but then also as a respectful person who’s trying to take a healthy approach to making these movies, we don’t want to trample down the forest. We want to treat the animal with respect as well, and not disrupt its lifestyle too much.
It’s a matter of being aware, and understanding what your limitations are. Make sure you’re with the experts and all the knowledge holders, and don’t do something stupid or unsafe just to get a really cool shot.
In dealing with different Indigenous communities and Elders, sharing either their personal stories or cultural information, you have to be very respectful. There was always a local person to talk to, and that person was allowed to say what they wanted to say, rather than just answer my questions.
We can’t organize things just for us. We say, ‘Can we come then, and film there?’ because a lot of things shouldn’t be filmed, or they don’t want them to be filmed for culturally sensitive reasons.
There’s 101 little practical things you’ve got to be aware of before you can get to the interesting, fun stuff.
SC: Was there anything about Squamish or B.C. in particular that really stood out for you?
JB: Being a city boy, just anywhere you go in B.C. is jaw droppingly beautiful. You can’t help but ask yourself, ‘Why do we keep ruining places like this? This is so, so incredible.’
Just seeing a beaver walk past you, or an eagle soar overhead, really brings it all home, and also emphasizes the plight and efforts made by the communities in Squamish, or the Okanagan, or on the east coast, or up north. They’re doing incredible things. It’s easy to talk about it in an academic data sort of way, but when you’re boots-on-the-ground, that’s inspiring.
We’re not making movies by accident. There’s a reason my colleagues and I are tromping through the woods or dangling from boats, or ski-dooing across the Northwest Territories in the middle of winter. These are adventures. It’s an incredible privilege.
“Animal Nation” will premiere on APTN in English on Jan. 8 at 7 p.m. ET, with streaming available on APTN+ on Jan. 9, available in English, French, and Mohawk versions.
