Review of Michael Leach's talk
at the 2003 Wrexham Science Festival

April 2003 Doreen McChristie Wrexham Mail

Up close and personal in world's wild places

MICHAEL Leach had some difficulty convincing his Science Festival audience that his job as a wildlife photographer and writer wasn't really as glamorous as it seemed.

Although he did describe some horrendous encounters with various types of bugs, the slides of his time 'up close and personal' with the mountain gorillas of Rwanda suggested it really was one of the best jobs in the world after all.

Michael spent two-and-a-half years observing and photographing gorillas, chimps and orang-utans in the wild for his book about great apes called 'Faces in the Mirror'. He has now produced more than 20 wildlife books, featuring big cats, polar bears and birds, but admits his favourite animal is the gorilla.

A natural entertainer, he held the audience at NEWI spellbound as he recounted some of his experiences in the cloud forests of the Virunga mountains.

These ranged from the terrifying moment when he was charged by a huge silverback, the dominant male in the group, to the intensely emotional feelings when he was trusted enough to have a wild baby gorilla asleep in his lap.

He said: 'It's very easy to empathise with primates compared to some of the other large mammals. Tigers and polar bears seem to be alien and dangerous, but we share more than 90% of our DNA with primates and we can understand the way they work. I have to say I can't remain aloof when it comes to primates and I'm hooked on gorillas.'

Michael always knew he wanted to work with animals, and when he'd finished his A-levels he took a year out to work as a keeper at Dudley Zoo. During his time there he hand-reared a baby leopard and took some photographs of it. He said: 'It suddenly dawned on me that somebody must be making all the fantastic films of wildlife that I loved to watch, and be getting paid to go all over the world to do it.

'I starved for a while and had to do all sorts of odd jobs to keep going, but then I managed to do some filming for the BBC in Bristol and that opened up a lot of doors for me. I worked on The World About Us and Wildlife on One, but eventually decided to move on to producing wildlife books.

'It's very satisfying to see something tangible at the end of two or three years of hard work, something that will still be there in 100 years.

As Michael's energetic style held the attention of listeners aged from under seven to more than 70, it was obvious he loved doing his job and telling other people about it.

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