Scorpions, snakes, sharks… a beloved asthmatic donkey. Renowned British naturalist, adventurer and television presenter Steve Backshall has always had a love of the natural world. He was determined to make a career from this passion and learnt a lot of lessons on the way.
Graduating with a degree in English and Theatre Studies, Steve’s need for adventure led him to his first job writing travel guidebooks as he explored new regions. But Steve was determined to take his passion further and had an idea that would ultimately lead to his breakthrough into television.
Clutching his own camera, he set off to Columbia for 6 weeks, making films of himself living in the wild, catching snakes, and interacting with a whole host of deadly creatures he would later become famous for bringing to our screens. Fuelled by his own ambition to make this a success, he sent the film to anyone and everyone he could think of working in TV. His break came from the National Geographic Channel where he started as an ‘Adventurer in Residence’ working on numerous projects.
But it wasn’t all smooth sailing for Steve, and he advocates that some of life’s most valuable lessons come from his 'complete disasters' along the way. One of his biggest challenges came in the form of a rock-climbing fall which saw him which resulted in multiple injuries, including breaking his back in two places. Taking over 11 operations and four years before he could walk properly again, the accident forced him to focus more on how he deals with risk. To be successful he strived to increase his skills and operate more effectively in challenging environments.
Steve’s role as host of a popular children’s wildlife show “Deadly 60”, in which he travels the globe to find and document the world’s most dangerous animals, inspires young viewers to appreciate and conserve wildlife. He has worked on numerous programmes and his work has earned him multiple awards, including two BAFTAs and an MBE in 2020 for his services to charity and wildlife conservation.
Now a proud father of three, Steve encourages people to find their own definition of success and to do what genuinely makes them happy. His adventures continue to inspire and educate, fostering a deeper understanding and respect for the planet's diverse ecosystems and their inhabitants.
Steve Backshall - video transcript
We learn so much more from our failures than we do from our successes. All of the things that I have learned that are most valuable to me are from messing up from just absolute disasters that I've had along the way, and it forces you to think, "what did I do wrong and how could I improve on it?"
When I was about four years old, my mom and dad got a ramshackle, run down old farm and filled it with rescue animals. We had an asthmatic donkey who couldn't get halfway through a bray without just about collapsing, a couple of guard dog geese, horses, peacocks, and beyond it was miles and miles of ancient woodland and the Surrey Heaths, and that was very much my playground as a child. I was certain that what I wanted to do would involve the outdoors and adventure and travel, and most importantly, animals. Throughout my childhood. That was it for me. I wanted to be that guy striding through the African bush, looking down and saying, "ah, lion, female was here two days ago."
I had big ideas and big ambitions when it came to my first expeditions, but I was very low on experience and skill, and so most of them were catastrophic. I can remember one particular expedition that I did in the Himalayas with some friends. We attempted to climb a technical and serious peak in the Himalayas, and about three quarters of the way up, particularly two of my friends, they had been suffering from high altitude pulmonary problems and they wanted to back out and to retreat. And I actually took a photo from the last pitch of climbing that we did on that route, and I blew it up onto a poster and I had it on my bedroom wall for about 15 years so that every time I got out of bed, I'd see that poster and I'd remember the weakness that had enabled me to turn around and how it felt, how I felt when I got down to basecamp, thinking "we could have done that".
So my first proper job was working as a writer, so I was writing guidebooks to various parts of the world, particularly Southeast Asia, and I was trying to sell articles to magazines and to newspapers. Financially. I was struggling more than I have at any other time in my life, and I suddenly came up with a hair brain scheme of trying to make a television series. I got myself a video camera, cheapest one I could possibly find, and looked around the globe to what I thought was the most rugged, wind swept, dangerous place that I could find, and it was Columbia. I stayed there for about six weeks and made my own little film, which had me catching snakes and spiders and scorpions and living rough and all the kinds of things that I do now, and made a bunch of videotapes, which I sent off to everyone. Every single person working in television in the UK would've had one of those grotty videotapes, and by chance, the head of the National Geographic got one and brought me in, and I left our first meeting with pretty much a blank cheque and the title of adventurer in residence at the National Geographic.
When I look back over my life and I look at the moments that have had the biggest impact on me, probably the one that stands out the most is my rock climbing fall. I was climbing on a damp day. I was lead climbing. I made a few mistakes and I fell from about 10 meters, 30 odd feet, onto rock. I broke my back into places. I put my left heel bone through the underside of my foot, and basically my left ankle was pulp. It took over 11 operations over four years before I was really walking properly, and it forced me to, I guess, focus on and get a new sense of what I would be capable of achieving. It has given me a new sense of my own mortality. It's made me reexamine how I deal with risk. It's been a huge, huge moment in my life.
I think a lot of success in my realm is about control. People might look at me hanging off a frozen waterfall by my ice axe or swimming alongside a great white shark, catching a venomous snake and think that I am a thrill seeker or an adrenaline junkie, a risk taker, it's the exact opposite. It's about having enough control over yourself and your life and the things around you that you can make the apparently dangerous safe. My definition of success has changed radically since becoming a father. If you'd asked me a couple of years ago, it would all have been based on my achievements and now pure and simple. I want to be a part of the solution, not part of the problem. I've seen with my own eyes over the last 25 years working, traveling, the effects that we as human beings are having on the planet. It is without question true that we are in the midst of the sixth great extinction event that this planet's faced and its caused by us.
The first advice I'd give to a young person who is seeking success would be, don't look at other people's definition of what success is. Find your own definition, and for most people, it's happiness. My teenage self, if he could see me now, just wouldn't believe it. I've been so privileged and so honored to be able to do what I do for a living, but ultimately, it's not been a mistake. This is who I am. It is my every waking second of my life, and to have had an opportunity to make that my job is my greatest privilege.
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Steve Backshall became a BAFTA award-winning TV presenter, explorer and naturalist.
He has travelled to some of the planet’s most remote and dangerous locations, uncovering new species, documenting elusive wildlife, and inspiring millions through his TV series.
As a passionate conservationist, he continues to promote the natural world and leads global efforts to protect it.
