Mountain hare.
I love winter! It is my favorite season for photography yet the most challenging. A season of beauty and wonders not seen any other time of the year. For instance, it’s the only time when you have any chance of seeing some very rare critters, like the mountain hare above. So keep your camera ready for those unexpected opportunities. Here are a few other wild rarities reserved for winter lovers. Continue reading
Short-tailed weasel.
This week there were a couple of expert mousers hanging out at my place. Actually there are no mice here, but lots of red-backed voles. As vole hunters go, nothing can match the tiny short-tailed weasel or ermine. Continue reading
Alaskan lynx
Some authors claim the lynx is strictly a hunter-predator. I have observed several lynx that do not fit perfectly into that mold. I do think lynx prefer fresh game they have killed themselves, But what if game is scarce and lynx are very hungry? This is the situation in much of interior Alaska this winter. The snowshoe hare population is currently at the bottom of its ten-year cycle. There are always a few snowshoe hares in prime habitat which is thick, white or black spruce mixed with a variety of other trees such as aspen, birch or poplar as well as willows and alder. But in the stands of pure black spruce, which dominate much of the landscape near my home snowshoe hare tracks are nearly absent. What remains for the lynx are primarily red squirrels, spruce grouse, willow ptarmigan, and voles. Lynx have been known to kill and eat red fox but that is not common. Same goes for mink, marten and the short-tailed weasel. And I suppose the lucky lynx could catch a woodpecker or gray jay if they were distracted. Continue reading
Twenty years ago, coyotes were one of my favorite photo subjects. This extremely adaptable species was both deadly hunter and scavenger. Nothing it seemed, was too large or too insignificant, too old or too new, to be left off the coyotes menu. Whether it was big game or game birds, domestic sheep or farm-yard chickens, coyotes made few friends. I guess I was one of just a few. The sheer variety of behavior they would engaged in, made each and every encounter a new and exciting adventure.
Coyote feeds on an elk in Wyoming. Tracks and blood in the snow told the story. Coyotes had harassed a cow and her big calf through the night. By morning at least thirteen coyotes had assembled and were finally able to bring down the large calf. Twelve hours later there was only a large trampled area of blood and hair remaining. Continue reading
Spectacular Wrangell Mountains in Alaska seem insignificant in this ineffective wide-angle photograph.
I remember my own fascination with the wide-angle lens. My first was a 24mm. The wide view had great appeal to me. It was thrilling to look at the landscape thru my lens. I could fit entire mountain ranges onto my tiny Kodachrome slide! And there lies the problem. A wide-angle lens often includes too much information with detail that is too small.
We expect the camera to record what we see. But, the fact is, we humans see things quite differently than any camera. Humans see their subject subjectively. We concentrate on our subject and don’t notice much else, missing details that we should be paying close attention to.
The camera records everything within the viewfinder, it sees objectively. Right down to all those distracting details we failed to notice.
In contrast, when we look at a mountain range or desert, we see the mountains, the terrain, we feel the wind, we get dust in our eye, we feel the cold or hot, We smell the pines or the sagebrush and the delicate fragrance of wildflowers as our gaze dances from flower to flower and bounce along with a foraging bumble bee.
Dall ram checks out photographer.
Walk softly and carry a big lens. All species of North American mountain sheep, the bighorns, Rocky Mountain bighorn and desert bighorn and the thinhorns, stone sheep and dall sheep are naturally skittish. Specific protocols are required when photographing wild sheep at close range. Ever on the lookout for predators, wild sheep are tuned into sounds of rocks tumbling down the mountainsides or moving across noisy scree slopes. Sudden movements or too much noise are likely to send mountain sheep stampeding towards the nearest cliffs. A telephoto lens is a must. The perspective a telephoto gives will separate your subject from the background. Continue reading
Dall ram peeks over a windswept ridge.
Pursuing wild rams in the far north is an addiction of mine. Those who are afflicted with this particular disease willingly subject themselves to cold and wind, sweat and pain. Other symptoms include an insatiable desire to witness dramatic wildlife amid glorious wilderness settings. Continue reading
A family group of tundra swans flies over Wrangell/St. Elias National Park in early October.
By mid October, open water becomes harder and harder to find and most waterfowl, ducks geese and swans, have already left Alaska. But the past two evenings, after dark, I heard migrating swans somewhere overhead. There were both tundra and trumpeter swans calling.
Tundra swans over the Wrangell Mountains. Continue reading
The last half of September brings Alaskan bull moose out of hiding. Bulls feed little or not at all for a couple weeks in latter September and early October. They have just one thing on their minds, cows.
Alaskan bull moose grunts as it travels in search of cows. Continue reading
Large male grizzly raids Deirdre Higgins kitchen in Slana, Alaska. To read the story how I got this photograph click on link below.
http://www.michaelquinton.com/picturestories/DeirdresGrizzly.aspx