I remember being quite excited to see black swans on my first visit to Australia. Turns out, they’re fairly common in many areas of the country, including Tasmania. This particular swan allowed me a pretty close approach and I was able to get an eye level perspective by lying face down at water’s edge on Bruny Island.
Nikon D810 with Nikkor 200-400mm lens (at 400mm) ISO 800, f/4 at 1/6400th of a second

And now for something a little more frightening. You can see why they call these guys devils. This one looks like it was trying to cast some sort of spell. It was photographed late one night on Maria Island, off the southeast coast of Tasmania.
Nikon D800 with Nikkor 70-200mm lens (at 110mm) ISO 800, f/8 at 1/250th of a second

Ordinarily, I try to do my best to avoid eyeshine when photographing animals at night. The best way to do this is to get the flash off the camera — preferably way off. But sometimes, even that doesn’t help if my positioning and distance to the subject isn’t quite right. In this case, the tripod mounted flash wasn’t far enough away from me to avoid the orange glow of the distant wallaby’s eye. I feel that in this photo, however, it ended up being a happy accident. The eyeshine adds life (and a bit of devilishness) to the wallaby as it casts a shadow across its face while cleaning, and seemingly hiding behind its tail.
Nikon D810 with Nikkor 200-400mm lens (at 400mm) ISO 800, f/4 at 1/200th of a second, Nikon SB-900 flash

I spent my second to last night in Tasmania with legendary Australian guide, Craig Bushie Williams. While searching for quolls in a wooded clearing, we spotted this mother common brushtail possum carrying her young joey on her back. I saw quite a few of these possums in Tasmania (and also on mainland Australia) but this was the only one I saw with a joey.
Nikon D810 with Nikkor 200-400mm lens (at 400mm) ISO 800, f/7.1 at 1/200th of a second, Nikon SB-900 flash unit

Behold the sugar glider. This is another one from the Bonorong Wildlife Sanctuary in Tasmania. Sugar gliders aren’t native to Tasmania but are an introduced species from mainland Australia. They are nocturnal and as the name suggests, they can fly — or glide, from tree to tree. Extremely cute, they have become a fairly common exotic pet in the United States.
Nikon D810 with Nikkor 105mm macro lens, ISO 1600, f/3.5 at 1/100th of a second

For this night shot of a Tasmanian pademelon and her joey, I was able to use a slow shutter speed to record color in the sky, while using an off camera flash to illuminate the pademelons. Pademelons are funny little macropods, smaller than wallabies and more round in shape. These two were in Narawntapu National Park on the northern coast of Tasmania.
Nikon D800 with Nikkor 70-200mm lens (at 120mm) ISO 1600, f/2.8 at half a second

I posted a wild eastern quoll when I first returned from Tasmania. This eastern quoll was a resident at the Bonorong Wildlife Sanctuary, a rehabilitation center for orphaned and injured animals, as well as a breeding center for Tasmanian devils. Quolls really are among the cutest animals that I’ve had the pleasure of photographing, and that’s about all I’ve got to say about this little guy.
Nikon D810 with Nikkor 200-400mm lens (at 200mm) ISO 1600, f/4.5 at 1/320th of a second

Wombats are funny creatures. They either scurried away as soon as I approached, or they let me get extremely close as if they didn’t have a care in the world. A few even pushed their noses up against my wide angle lens. This guy let me get extremely close, but had the added comfort of being at the opening of his burrow. I was using a fisheye lens when I captured this yawn.
Nikon D810 with Sigma 15mm fisheye lens, ISO 800, f/4 at 1/400th of a second

Here’s another look at the white wallaby with brown joey that I got to know on Bruny Island in Tasmania. In this shot, the joey had just crawled out of the mother’s pouch. You can see that the joey does have quite a bit of white coloration on the stomach, no doubt inherited from mom. I took this photo about fifty yards from the accommodation I was staying at (Inala Cottage). I was able to spend a lot of time with the wallabies so they were quite comfortable with my presence and I was able to get a few intimate shots like this one.
Nikon D810 with Nikkor 200-400mm lens (at 330mm) ISO 1600, f/5.6 at 1/640th of a second

As I mentioned in a previous post, the landscape of Tasmania is extremely diverse — especially for an island that’s only about the size of Georgia or West Virginia. These two photos were taken at Cradle Mountain National Park in the north central mountains. The top shot is a boardwalk along the Waterfalls Walk. The entire track is boardwalk and leads to two waterfalls. The bottom shot is a river along a track appropriately called The Enchanted Walk. Both photos highlight the mossy forest typical of Cradle Mountain. It feels as if dwarves and elves might be hiding just around the corner.
Top Photo: Nikon D800 with Nikkor 17-35mm lens (at 17mm) ISO 200, f/18 at 1 second
Bottom Photo: Nikon D800 with Nikkor 17-35mm lens (at 17mm) ISO 64, f/20 at 5 seconds