Sometimes called the lesser anteater, the northern tamandua ranges from southern Mexico to northern South America. I photographed this one quite a few years ago while in the Osa Peninsula of southern Costa Rica. Unlike giant anteaters, tamanduas spend the majority of their time in trees. Nikon D200 with Nikkor 70-200mm lens (at 200mm) ISO 400, f/4 at 1/250th of a second, Nikon SB-600 fill flash.
A year ago, Fox61 News in Connecticut aired a story on my camera trapping during the pandemic. Tonight they ran a follow up piece on what I’ve been up to since then.
It’s easy to see why they call these guys spider monkeys. Less obvious is why they call them Geoffroy’s spider monkeys. Photographed on the Yucatan Peninsula of Mexico. Nikon D800 with Nikkor 200-400mm lens (at 260mm) ISO 1600, f/4 at 1/640th of a second.
These guys are very large tree frogs. Also known as rusty tree frogs, I saw several of them while on night excursions by boat in the Peruvian Amazon, usually high in a tree along the river bank. Nikon D500 with Nikkor 500mm PF lens, ISO 400, f/8 at 1/100th of a second, Godox V860iii flash with Westcott soft box.
Here’s another one from the Ripley Waterfowl Conservancy in Litchfield, Connecticut. They have two red-crowned cranes there, also known as Japanese cranes or Manchurian cranes. As the name would suggest, they live mainly in parts of Japan and China, as well as Russia, Mongolia, Taiwan and Korea. They are one of the rarest cranes in the world and are known as symbols of luck, longevity and fidelity. The red on their crown is actually a patch of bare, wattled skin, which you can see in this image. This is another species that I have not photographed in the wild, but would love to get back to Japan for winter wildlife. Nikon D500 with Nikkor 500mm PF lens, ISO 500, f/5.6 at 1/400th of a second.
A polar bear walks along the shoreline of the Hudson Bay, waiting for the water to freeze so that he can go out and hunt seals. Nikon D300 with Nikkor 200-400mm lens (at 400mm) ISO 800, f/5.6 at 1/1000th of a second.
A northern elephant seal catches an early-morning shaft of light on a beach in central California. Nikon D300 with Nikkor 200-400mm lens (at 240mm) ISO 800, f/4 at 1/400th of a second.
I photographed this black-backed jackal very late in the day in the Kalahari Desert of Botswana. The landscape is so flat that the sun has nowhere to hide until hitting the horizon — enabling rich, saturated colors just before the light disappears. Nikon D300 with Nikkor 200-400mm lens (at 400mm) ISO 800, f/4 at 1/400th of a second.
I saw a few of these great black hawks while in Amazonian Peru. They are large hawks that range from Mexico down through South America as far as northern Argentina. In April of 2018 one got lost and ended up in Maine where it was caught in a snow storm and eventually captured and brought to a rehab facility. It was ranked as the “#1 Craziest Vagrant of 2018.” Nikon D500 with Nikkor 500mm PF lens, ISO 800, f/5.6 at 1/250th of a second, Godox V860iii fill flash.
Wombats seem to do one thing — eat grass. Lawns are always well manicured in areas where they live, like this field in Cradle Mountain National Park in Tasmania, Australia. They’re often so consumed with the task at hand they don’t notice a close approach with a wide-angle lens. This guy came right up to my camera and didn’t miss a beat. Nikon D800 with Nikkor 17-35mm lens (at 17mm) ISO 800, f/5 at 1/400th of a second.