An evening search for Grizzlies turned up something quite unexpected…a Grey Wolf! I consider myself extremely lucky to see one of these majestic creatures 🙂
Yellow-crowned Nightheron – Ixtapa, Mexico
Return of the Redpolls – 7 Dec, 2014
Winter 2013/14 in Calgary was virtually devoid of winter finches (redpolls, siskins, grosbeaks, etc) so it’s been great to see some of them return this winter. However, I had not seen any redpolls until today when a pair flew over my head and conveniently landed in the tree next to me. I love the colours of Redpolls, especially the pink males!
Kananaskis Critters – Summer 2014
After 2 years of concentrating almost exclusively on birds as subject matter, early in 2014 my wife suggested I try my hand at shooting some of the many mammals that inhabit Alberta. Perhaps not unsurprisingly, I found bird photography skills to be very transferable to mammal photography and so, like bird photography again, the real challenge became finding the subjects!
The highlights of the summer for me were undoubtedly the Grizzlies – a species I’d only ever seen once in my 7 years in Alberta.
Closely followed by the outrageously cute Pikas:
And of course, finally seeing a full-blown bull moose in peak condition:
I hope to add to this initial portfolio next year, and will be on the look-out for some of the more elusive animals such as bobcats and lynx, wolves, and all of the weasel family! Any tips on where to find these hard-to-find creatures would be most welcome, so please drop me a line.
Ducks over the Bow – 2 Feb, 2014
Spent two hours in the afternoon shooting various ducks on the Bow River, just south of Calgary. While Common Goldeneyes made up the majority, a real bonus was getting images of a male Barrow’s Goldeneye – a lifer for me! He was also cooperative enough to do a couple of take-offs pretty much right in front of me.
All through this session I’d been sitting on snow & when I got up to leave I realised that my butt was pretty much frozen and I went through some rather painful thawing out in the car on the way home. My learning is to bring something to sit on (like a roll-up camping mat)!