I grew up in Minnesota, spent summers at the family cabin, and paddled in the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness as a Boy Scout. When I was 17, I wrote an article about fly-fishing and sold it to Outdoor Life. Selling that piece condemned me to the dream of becoming a free-lance outdoor writer. After graduating from the University of Minnesota and despite occasional employment as a newspaper reporter, natural resources planner, and magazine writer, a freelance writer is what I became. Over time, my range of subjects expanded from outdoor adventure to include all kinds of science, medicine and health, and interesting people. The other day, when curiosity got the best of me, I scrolled through my files and discovered that I have written thousands of articles for well over 130 different clients and publications, from The New York Times to The Nature Conservancy.

I addition to writing, I also teach magazine writing and travel writing at the Loft Literary Center in Minneapolis, a nationally renowned organizations to support and train writers and support the literary arts.

I still hunt, fish, camp, and paddling canoes and kayaks—usually with my wife, Susan. We split our time between home in St. Paul, our cabin in Fifty Lakes, Minnesota, and traveling where the birds fly, the fish bite, and the rivers run free.