Gillian.Sciuto

= Steve Irwin Biography = 

 Steve Irwin was born on February 22nd, 1962 in Essendon, Australia. His father was a plumber and his mother was a nurse. Steve’s family was very nice to wildlife, they rescued local animals from their neighborhood and they rehabilitated them. His family started to be more interested in animal life as Steve grew up. As a matter of fact, for Steve’s 6th birthday his parents adopted a python that Steve had named Fred. By the time Steve was 9 his dad started to take him crocodile hunting. The very first crocodile Steve wrestled was 3ft, “I got my legs around his neck and he was trashing about. It was like being tossed around in a washing machine…it was an out-of-body experience. I knew then that catching crocs was the life for me!” A couple of years later Steve’s family opened up the Beerwah Reptile Park. Usually when Steve and his dad went crocodile hunting, they would bring them home and try to find the best home for them but they wanted to open a park of their own. Many people were against what Steve was doing, they thought that they were taking animals from their great lives and making them suffer in a new habitat. But Steve’s family was doing the absolute opposite of that, they actually saved the animals from dangerous habitats and rehabilitated them into safer and better ones. In 1980 the Irwin’s’ renamed the park to the Queensland Reptile Park. Queensland was where Steve grew up most of his life. They renamed it where Steve wrestled his first crocodile. As Steve grew older he became very loyal to the park, he worked there every day after home school. He worked more than most of the park’s staff. When Steve grew up he went to a college in Australia for wildlife preservation. In 1991 Steve’s parents retired from the park and left it in the hands of Steve. He was very proud to be the new owner of the park, he had lots and lots of new plans and ideas for the park to become a better place. In the first week that Steve took over he put in new habitat areas for all types of animals and renamed the park to the Australian Zoo. When he was at a wildlife preservation conference he met a woman named Terri Raines. Soon after they got married and from that point on that’s when Steve got more and more famous. On their honeymoon they were off the coast of Australia catching crocodiles. They filmed the entire thing and posted it onto the Australian Zoo website. Discovery Channel saw the video and was then on the phone with Steve asking to be that star of the show The Crocodile Hunter. Steve accepted and the show became a hit, by 2004 over 500 million people watched the show in over 120 different countries. Although Steve was a major star he didn’t do anything for recognition. “I don’t care about the money or publicity, I love what I do and that’s why I do it.” Terri and Steve had a daughter that they named Bindi, after their favorite crocodile in the zoo. Later they also had a boy named Bob, who was named after the largest snake in the zoo. One day Steve was feeding crocodiles and held Bob a little too close to the edge where the crocodiles jump up for the food. The zoo had to shut down temporarily because the police and wildlife specialists thought the crocodiles and some animals are not trained and may be a threat to the people, also Terri and Steve are faced with child services. Steve was mortified and quoted that he would never put his child or any child in danger. In 2005 Steve died filming stingrays in Port Douglas. While filming a sting ray got aggravated and become dangerous and it pierced an 8ft long poisonous barb into Steve’s heart. He died before the ambulance and rescue team got there. I chose to research Steve Irwin because to me he is a role model to all people, especially young children. He was famous for safely capturing live animals that are in danger and rehabilitating them away from danger. He was working to change the world so that everyone would love wildlife as he did. For Steve’s actions, before he died he discovered a new breed of turtles and didn’t get to name it. The scientists that helped studied the breed names it the Elseya Irwinis.

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