Bart the Bear II, who appeared in Dr. Dolittle 2, Into the Wild, and We Bought a Zoo, has passed away. He was 21 years old at the time.

Bart died quietly at home over the weekend in Heber City, Utah, after a downturn in his health this year, according to Ryan Lutey, executive director of the Vital Ground Foundation.

Bart was as an ambassador for Vital Ground, a land trust based in Missoula, Montana, that focuses on maintaining grizzly bear habitat, safeguarding genetic corridors for all wildlife and botanicals, and reducing bear-human conflicts.

Bart also appeared in Without a Paddle (2004), An Unfinished Life (2005), Evan Almighty (2007), Did You Hear About the Morgans? (2009), Zookeeper (2011), Into the Grizzly Maze (2015), and Pete’s Dragon (2016), as well as in the 2005 TNT miniseries Into the West, HBO’s Game of Thrones, and commercials.

After their mother was killed by a hunter in Alaska’s Wrangell Mountains, Bart and his sister, Honey Bump, were orphaned.
The hungry cubs were discovered by a bear researcher and ended up with Vital Ground co-founders Doug and Lynne Seus just as Big Bart, “the core of our tribe,” was dying of cancer.

“He leaves an enormous legacy of grizzly bear conservation,” Lutey said in a statement. “During his two decades as a Vital Ground ambassador, Bart’s charisma helped conserve and enhance hundreds of thousands of acres of habitat for his fellow grizzlies and all the species that share their range, from elk and moose to bull trout, butterflies and plants.”