About

Rupert Pilkington is a wildlife management specialist and expedition travel guide with a particular interest in large mammals and the preservation of their wild habitats.  Originally from Scotland, his formal education culminated in a master's degree in Rural and Regional Resources Planning, from Aberdeen University.  A dedicated conservationist, Rupert has worked with many species including red deer, mule deer, moose, bighorn sheep, peregrine falcons, wolves, and bears.  During five seasons as a wildlife technician with the US National Park Service, he developed a special interest in bears while working in the bear management program in Alaska's Denali National Park.  Rupert emigrated to Canada in 1997, where he worked initially as a bear/human conflict management specialist, and in the Eastern Slopes Grizzly Bear Study, in Banff National Park.  In 2000, Rupert established Ursus International, an organization dedicated to wilderness preservation and sustainable ecosystem management through bear conservation.  He has lectured and taught courses and programs on bear biology, wildlife management and safety, and ecology, for a variety of universities, companies, and vocational study facilities.  Rupert spends part of the summers working as a guide and lecturer for Zegrahm Expeditions, in Svalbard, Greenland and the eastern Canadian Arctic and sub-Arctic.  He has also done extensive guiding and lecturing work in Alaska, British Columbia, Norway and the Russian Far East, and each autumn, he teaches courses on polar bear biology and conservation at the Churchill Northern Studies Centre, at Churchill, Manitoba.  In 2010, Rupert expanded Ursus International to include adventure travel itineraries of its own, at Hudson Bay and in British Columbia, and in 2011 he affiliated it with Blue Planet Expeditions, to offer small-ship expedition cruise trips to Svalbard, Scotland and Ireland.