Bookworm, Issue 34
The Book: Tigers Between Empires: The Improbable Return of Great Cats to the Forests of Russia and China by Jonathan C. Slaght
Travel to the remote forests of northeast Asia with author and wildlife biologist Jonathan Slaght to experience the magnificence of the world’s largest tiger and the dogged determination of an unlikely coalition of people working to save this endangered species. In Tigers Between Empires, Slaght interprets the complex circumstances that shape tiger population decline and tells the three-decade-long story of the Siberian Tiger Project’s efforts to help these cats recover.
The book follows a team of American and Russian scientists who begin collaring and studying Amur tigers in Primorye Province in 1992, right after the fall of the Soviet Union. American Dale Miquelle, a moose biologist, is the Project’s field leader in Russia. Upon arrival he is met with a rise in tiger poaching and habitat destruction, the results of recent instability and inflation. The team’s conservation mission is more urgent than ever.
But in order to convince people that a predator like the Amur tiger is worth saving, the team must first capture one to begin collecting data. A tiger sighting in the wild is rare and unforgettable; according to Slaght, “(t)hese animals evoke awe, respect, fear – anything but apathy.” And so, our paired wine is one that also provokes strong feelings; popular in recent years, but still quite polarizing.
The author is uniquely qualified to tell the Siberian Tiger Project’s story. Slaght speaks Russian and has spent years in Russia’s Far East working, studying, and serving in the Peace Corps. In 2002 the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS), Dale’s employer, supported Slaght’s research on Blakiston’s fish owls while he earned his master’s and doctorate degrees. (I highly recommend his previous book, Owls of the Eastern Ice.) WCS eventually hired him, and Dale remains his mentor and friend.
These experiences inform this richly-detailed narrative and allow Slaght to bring to life Primorye’s landscape and people and the project’s groundbreaking science. Walk past Korean pines “with diameters as wide as doorframes,” and collar tigers with whiskers “like porcupine quills.” The deerskin-clad Russians are at home in the woods, whereas the Americans, in their “blue jeans and L.L. Bean fleeces,” must overcome language barriers, isolation, and loneliness. The entire team contends with fuel shortages, equipment failures, food rationing, extreme winter weather, and long days of dangerous and physically-demanding work.
A one-year-old cub, named Olga, is the Project’s first capture, and she will be monitored longer than any other tiger in the world. Subsequently, each radio-collared tiger is named, and we come to care deeply about their fates. Alongside Dale, we listen to Olga’s mother calling for her; we witness her rage, coming eye-to-eye with the team attempting to re-capture her; and when the tigress is sedated, we can almost feel her chest expanding as she breathes. Here, in the tigers’ stories, we grasp that “lives (are) at stake, both wild and human.”
Additionally, a deep understanding of the region’s history, politics, culture, and natural environment provides important context alongside the story of the Siberian Tiger Project’s work. For example, local people need forest resources to survive; yet in a depressed economy, desperation drives overconsumption. Slaght unravels the web of complicated forces affecting the Amur tiger population. Roads and development, logging, poaching, and disease (among other things) all threaten their survival.
By connecting the big picture to personal stories, Tigers Between Empires underscores how closely all living things are connected. Project scientists take extraordinary measures to understand and save the Amur tiger – a few even devote their lives to the cause. Sometimes this level of commitment is necessary. But we all have a role to play in conservation. We can start with a willingness to care – about a distant place, an elusive predator, and an unlikely alliance – and carry that care into how we live, in harmony with one another and the natural world.
The Wine: Jure Brumec, ‘Ottokar,’ štajerska, Slovenia, 2021 $19.99
Copper-orange, textured, lively, and long-lasting. A dry, skin-contact white wine that shimmers prettily in the glass – and on the palate. The product of a harmonious blend of tradition and experimentation.
Aromatically-integrated on the nose with notes of dried apricot, peach yogurt, marmalade, orange blossom, ripe melon, dried hay, pine resin, and ginger. Additionally, on the palate, find flavors of dried mint and oregano, pink peppercorns, and yellow grapefruit pith. Not quite full-bodied, but with mouth-filling, memorable texture. Medium-low, persistent tannins alongside remarkable acidity. 12.5% ABV. Pronounced flavor intensity and a long, refreshing finish that concludes on a pleasantly-bitter note.
40% Pinot Gris, 40% Sauvignon Blanc, 20% Traminer from sustainably-farmed, non-irrigated vineyards. Grapes are hand-harvested and then de-stemmed into small open casks. Fermented, separately, with native yeast and macerated on the skins for 25 days in open tanks at low temperatures. Matured one year in 300 L Slavonian oak barrels.
Serve “slightly chilled,” 55-63 F, cellar to cool room temperature. If too cold, the wine will taste bitter and astringent, and the aromas will be muted. Orange wines are incredibly food-friendly and pair well with cheeses and cured meats, spicy or earthy vegetarian dishes, fish, and lean meat.
If you are curious about the picture on the label, check out this story from the winemaker about a monk, a rabbit, and a spiritual journey.
Thank you to Daniel Brashi at South Lyndale Liquors for recommending this wine to me. It’s fantastic!
Why the pairing works:
An obvious observation inspired this pairing – the color orange – a match between the wine’s and the Amur tiger’s visual appearance. While the wine and the book pair wonderfully for several other reasons, let’s talk about color first.
In Tigers Between Empires, Slaght describes Dale’s first Amur tiger sighting, and how, despite the cat’s orange and black coat, it “looked perfect” in the Russian forest, “clearly at home among the gray, uneven lines of oak and birch trunks, surrounded by pillows of snow.” The entire paragraph is beautifully written and a turning point in the story. Fresh tiger tracks in the snow lead the team to their first success, after weeks of disappointment.
So now, let’s consider the wine, Ottokar.
Orange wine, sometimes called amber or skin-contact wine, is made when winemakers apply red winemaking techniques to white grapes, keeping juice in contact with the skins and seeds to extract color, flavor, and tannin. The practice is ancient, likely originating in the Republic of Georgia, but is now popular worldwide. Because tannin helps preserve wine, many orange wines have little or no added sulfur and are considered natural wines.
Interesting and complex, orange wines have bold aromas, deep flavors, and tannic structure. The juice can macerate and ferment with the skins and seeds anywhere from a day to an entire year. Some, like Ottokar, undergo further aging in neutral oak barrels or in bottle. Rather than tart citrus or tangy fruit notes, expect dried flowers and dried stone fruit, depending on grape variety, length of skin contact, and type of fermentation vessel.
Ottokar is not a “quiet” wine – our palates react to the wine’s intensity and texture. It reminds me of Dale’s reaction to and description of an Amur tiger’s roars “not in volume but in size: they were not loud; they were huge. It was a sound that moved through his body…”
Both Amur tigers and orange wines occupy in-between spaces. The tigers reside in the forests between Russia and China, their survival dependent on cross-border cooperation and habitat preservation. While orange wines live on the spectrum between bright whites and intense reds.
Orange wines challenge expectations and can be controversial among wine enthusiasts and professionals. Are the wine’s characteristics features or flaws? My hope is that you’ll try this wine to determine your preferences for yourself. Perhaps it will change your perspective?
In the book, the Siberian Tiger Project biologists work tirelessly to change attitudes, demonstrating that “tigers and people could live together.” While tasting wine is a very different experience from seeing a tiger in the wild, this passage from Slaght’s book stood out to me:
Russian villagers, when recounting their own tiger experiences, tell stories full of color, motion, and smell. It’s as though the body understands the weight of the moment and absorbs as much sensory information as possible before the experience ends.
Drinking wine involves all the senses, as well. We examine the color, smell the aromas, assess the flavors and textures on the palate. And if the wine is delicious, then it is unforgettable, too.