Georg Wilhelm Steller: Pioneer of Alaskan Natural History and Survivor of the Kamchatka Expedition
This botanical history post was featured on The Daily Gardener podcast:
March 10, 1709
Dearest reader,
On this day, with shovels at the ready and curiosity in bloom, we honor the birth of Georg Wilhelm Steller—a German botanist, zoologist, physician, and intrepid explorer whose name leaves bright, wild traces across the tapestry of Alaskan natural history.
Steller, with roots reaching into Russian soil and dreams sprawling toward the unknown, dared what few would: he sought discovery not merely for glory, but in pursuit of nature's rich and untranslatable secrets.
How many of us, I wonder, would have the courage to step beyond the familiar garden gate and wander into territories both wondrous and perilous?
It was in 1739 that Steller, ever the scholarly adventurer, joined the Second Kamchatka Expedition led by the famed Danish cartographer Vitus Bering. This enterprise, bravely sponsored by Russia, was not for the fainthearted—its mission was to map and probe the wild edges of the world. When their ship, the St. Peter, found itself drawn to Alaska’s distant coastline, Georg, unable to quell his scientific longing, begged to explore Kayak Island. Bering granted him ten hours, making Georg one of the first foreigners to set foot on Alaskan soil.
Reader, can you imagine what one might discover given just ten hours in a place no one of your people had seen before?
What would you collect—stone, seed, or secret?
Indeed, Steller’s voracious attention to the natural wonders around him carved his legacy into the very lexicon of discovery—Steller's jay, with a flash of blue as vivid as a gardener's dream; Steller's sea lion, powerful and rare, haunting rocky shores with its thunderous calls.
Is it not delightful to ponder that every time we catch sight of these creatures, we honor the man who first penned their names into posterity?
Yet, this tale is more than a recital of wild triumph. On that fateful journey, adversity ran rampant—in the form of scurvy, the gardener’s plague of the sea.
Georg Steller tried to persuade the crew to eat green leaves and berries he gathered on land to combat the scurvy that was becoming an epidemic on the ship. But the officers poo-pooed his suggestions on this matter.
How often, dear gardener, do the boldest solutions grow unnoticed in plain sight, dismissed by those unwilling to trust green wisdom?
When the ship staggered onward with only a dozen weary souls left upright, disaster finally forced them aground. When only a dozen men were left standing to run the ship, they shipwrecked on an island where Bering and half the men died of scurvy. Georg and his assistant never suffered from scurvy, and they nursed the survivors back to health.
There, upon that forlorn and now storied island—Bering Island, so named for the leader lost—Steller’s argonauts built a vessel anew from what little hope and timber remained, finally sailing home in 1742.
What seeds did hardship plant in these men’s hearts?
What knowledge, born from desperation and nature’s quiet grace, do we still cultivate today?
Might one dare to say that, sometimes, the most vital lessons in prudence, patience, and healing come not from polished lectures, but from the wild and untamed?
So as you return to your own patch of earth, take a moment to reflect: what small pieces of wisdom, overlooked by others, might be the very thing to save your garden—and perhaps even yourself?
