This is an old one from back in 2008. I was driving down the California coast from San Francisco to Los Angles and stopped off at Año Nuevo State Park to see what I could find. It was first thing in the morning and this elephant seal had the beach to himself, waiting for females to arrive for the yearly mating and birthing season which takes place from December through March. Since then I have spent many hours photographing both northern elephant seals in California, as well as their larger cousins, the southern elephant seals down in the Falkland Islands. Nikon D300 with Nikkor 17-35mm lens (at 35mm) ISO 400, f/4 at 1/250th of a second.

Saw these two ladies strolling along the side of the road recently. Seemed an appropriate post for today (well, technically tomorrow). Have a great holiday everyone and see you back here next week. Nikon Z8 with Nikkor 500mm PF lens, ISO 6400, f/5.6 at 1/500th of a second.

I photographed this garter snake in my backyard a few summers ago. The snake had just swallowed a toad and was moving very slowly, allowing me a close approach with my macro lens. Snakes use their forked tongues to collect chemical information from two different locations at once. This helps with navigation — in sort of a 3D kind of way — when looking for food, a mate and whatever else snakes are into these days. Nikon D850 with Nikkor 105mm macro lens, ISO 800, f/7.1 at 1/640th of a second.

It’s that time of year again when great grey owls start getting active in northern Minnesota. I’ve visited the last few years and am thinking about another trip out soon. This was taken in December of 2021 after the tamarack trees had turned a bright orange. Great greys become most active at dawn and dusk, hunting in clearings in the northern forests. Nikon D500 with Nikkor 500mm PF lens, ISO 800, f/5.6 at 1/1600 of a second.

It’s been a few months since a bear strolled past one of my camera traps. This beauty, either a female or young male, stopped by Sunday afternoon. Nice to get the blue sky and last remaining leaves still clinging to the trees. Most of the action this year has been at night so the diurnal setting was a pleasant surprise. Nikon D810 with Nikkor 17-35mm lens (at 19mm) ISO 500, f/14 at 1/200th of a second, Cognisys camera box, trail monitor and three remote flash units.

I captured this image of an eastern striped skunk with a three-flash camera trap setup. The main flash is on the ground behind the log providing the strong backlighting of the whiskers. There’s actually a smaller log behind the visible log, which the skunks, raccoons and opossums occasionally use to get from one side of our back yard to another. Nikon D810 with Nikkor 17-35mm lens (at 20mm) ISO 500, f/11 at 20 seconds, Cognisys camera box, trail monitor and remote flash units.

It’s always fun to photograph mountain goats because they conveniently prefer to hang out in spectacular alpine settings. I met this young goat a few years back not too far from Denver in Colorado. We were both up above the clouds as the day came to a close. Nikon D810 with Nikkor 17-35mm lens (at 35mm) ISO 800, f/10 at 1/800th of a second.

I took this one on a trip to Yellowstone a few years back. It was late September and the rising sun added some interesting flare to the backlit mountain bluebird. Nikon D810 with Nikkor 200-400mm lens (at 400mm) ISO 800, f/4 at 1/3200th of a second.

A little burrowing owl was having a nice stretch with that right leg. These diurnal owls that live in the ground are fairly widespread throughout the Americas. An especially large population of them live in Cape Coral, Florida in and amongst all the suburban population. Nikon D500 with Nikkor 200-400mm lens (at 280mm) ISO 800, f/4 at 1/160th of a second.

It was about this time back in 2017 when I visited Silver Salmon Creek up in Alaska. The coastal brown bears would forage mostly on the marsh grasses, but would also come out to the shoreline at low tide and try their best to catch coho salmon. Obviously, this mother was successful and she brought the fish back to her two cubs who were waiting not so patiently on a nearby sandbar. Nikon D500 with Nikkor 200-400mm lens (at 330mm) ISO 1600, f/4 at 1/1600th of a second.