'Crocodile Hunter' Stalked Danger

Robert J. Thompson, the founding director of the Center for the Study of Popular Television at Syracuse University, said Irwin was the "consummate cable star" who "liberated the nature documentary from bounds of educational documentary" with his vaudeville-like comic touches.

Irwin did for Animal Planet what "South Park" did for Comedy Central and "Queer Eye for the Straight Guy" did for Bravo, Thompson said. "Entire cable channels are made by one or two big hits," he said. "It's a very different cultural model than for the broadcast era."

In 1992, Irwin married an Oregon-born naturalist, Terri Raines, who became his filming and writing partner. She and their two young children, Bindi Sue and Robert, survive him.

Irwin's insistence on face-to-face meetings with his subjects sometimes brought him trouble from authorities.

While filming in Antarctica in 2004 for a documentary, he was criticized by animal-rights groups for allegedly violating an Australian prohibition against human interaction with the wildlife.

"Totally beat up, mate," he told an interviewer. "Like I'm tobogganing over there, the penguin's over there -- what's the big deal? Don't know what they're on about there. Don't understand that one at all."

Nothing came of the controversy, but Irwin had long spoken out about the need for such proximity to animals.

"The day has come where we can't keep looking at wildlife on a long lens on a tripod, which, historically, nature documentaries have done," Irwin said. "Then there's this voice of God telling you about the cheetah kill. After 450,000 cheetah kills, it's not entertaining anymore."