Dr. Steven Baker is one of Habitat’s founding veterinarians and the soul of many of our stories, jokes, and bonfire night sing-a-longs. He’s spent decades blending skilled medicine with a deep commitment to the human-animal bond—and to the people who trust us with their pets.
Dr. Baker attended the University of Montana, the University of Maine, and Colorado State University, where he earned his veterinary degree in 1995. His career as a mixed animal relief veterinarian took him across the globe and far off the beaten path—from C-sections in Wyoming snowstorms to sheep milking parlors in the Basque Country of northern Spain. Before all that, he was a smokejumper in Washington, Alaska, and Boise, parachuting into wildfires for nearly two decades before transitioning to veterinary medicine full time.
In 2007, Dr. Baker helped open Habitat Veterinary Hospital in Boise alongside Dr. Sohaila Maleki and Dr. Reed Linenberger. In 2023, he was instrumental in Habitat’s expansion to Ketchum, where he had deep ties to the community and a longstanding friendship with Dr. Karsten Fostvedt, the founder of St. Francis Pet Clinic.
In the fall of 2023, Dr. Baker experienced a significant medical emergency that changed the shape of his daily work. He was diagnosed with a series of strokes affecting his brainstem, thalamus, and hypothalamus, and has been in active recovery ever since. True to form, he’s facing it head-on—with determination, humor, and more than a few creative solutions, including a custom magnet-and-glasses system (invented by a fellow vet) to help him see. While he’s not currently seeing patients, his presence is deeply felt in the culture, care philosophy, and foundation of Habitat. We miss seeing him in the clinic every day—but we know he’s walking the long road back with the same heart and resilience he’s always brought to the pets and people who love him.
Outside of veterinary medicine, Dr. Baker has always been a force of nature—whether he was surfing, kiteboarding, mountain biking, or picking his banjo by the river with his pudelpointer, Otter. While recovery has shifted his pace for now, that same adventurous spirit, sense of humor, and creative problem-solving are very much alive and well. He shares his life with his wife Mary Ann, their daughter Caroline, and pudelpointer Franklin.