Poachers, Polluters, and Politics: A Fishery Officer's Career

In this enjoyable memoir, author Nelson, a 35-year veteran of the Canadian Department of Fisheries and Oceans, details his adventures catching poachers, busting corporate polluters, and wrangling with bureaucrats. A wildlife officer's job is dangerous but rewarding, and early on Nelson became "addicted to catching poachers." Born on a Saskatchewan farm, he made his first bust at 19 when he charged several men (including an RCMP officer) with catching over the limit in walleye. Thus began a life-long pursuit of wildlife scofflaws that took Nelson to British Columbia. There, he tangled with criminals armed with knives, axes, guns, and explosives and dealt with an endless parade of lowlifes bent on depleting BC's salmon populations. Beyond poachers, Nelson also often encountered corner-cutting industrial polluters who despoiled natural habitat in examples of "corporate arrogance." Adept at the desk as well as in the field, he learned how to deal with bean-counting government managers and worked at building relationships between the First Nations tribes, local and federal agencies, and private interests jockeying for a cut of BC's finite natural resources. Written chronologically as a series of short chapter/vignettes, Nelson's memoir should appeal to anyone even remotely interested in nature%E2%80%94and what it takes to preserve it. (June)