I’ve always taken great comfort in photographing the same scene over time so it was a delight on a visit to Yellowstone in 2011 to retake a shot from 2009, although this time with a difference: I used a telephoto instead of a normal lens.
Author: boolie
The Beauty of the Auto Tour
While on a visit to Ridgefield on a rainy Christmas in 2011, I accidentally took a short nap while in a pullout beside Rest Lake (I mean, given the name of the lake, hardly my fault) which meant I was lucky enough to be in the right position when driving past the meadow that I got to spend quite a while watching a coyote hunting voles in the rain. It’s what I loved about the auto tour, getting to watch animals behave naturally at relatively close distances without disturbing them.
These pictures are a bit bittersweet as while I got to watch the family at length multiple times that winter, my pictures from a couple of months later would be my last photos of coyotes at the refuge as they were shot to create a safer haven for the threatened Columbian white-tailed deer that were about to be transplanted. Thankfully the deer seemed to be establishing themselves by the time I had to say goodbye to the refuge so hopefully coyotes have been allowed back since.
I’m not sure the many Townsend’s voles in the meadows around the refuge missed the coyotes, although perhaps they didn’t notice given the wide variety of predators that ate them. It was always a little hard to watch through the big lens as one little life was snuffed out, even knowing it allowed another life to continue. I always hoped to photograph a vole on its own but I only ever managed to catch them when something else caught them first.
Ready for a Nap
I’ve been editing some old pictures to bring old blog posts back online and was surprised to find this picture of a young Samwise snuggling up on my legs, adopted a month prior, never made it online. He turns 13 this month, with Ellie gone all the pets he grew up with have died. He loved being the youngest so I feel for the tender-hearted little fellow. He’s not wanted Trixie to snuggle up with him lately but that may be more a displeasure with the summer heat, we’ll see in a bit when the worst of the heat breaks for the year.
Williamson’s Sapsucker
A trip to New Mexico in 2007 provided my one and only view of the lovely Williamson’s sapsucker, this is a male perched on a favorite tree. They prefer Ponderosa Pine forests and that’s not a habitat I’ve been in much since. You can see the irregular and regular pattern of holes he’s drilled into the tree to encourage it to secrete the sap he craves. It was a wonderful trip although it had far more import than I could have known as when it came time to look for work a decade later, it got me thinking of New Mexico, which got me thinking about Arizona, and here we are.
Purple Crown
A Costa’s hummingbird shows off his purple crown on a winter morning. The color is based on the way the light falls upon the feathers, not pigment, so when he had his head turned his crown appeared black (as the rest of his face and throat does here, but they will light up too if the light is at the right angle).
All-Crab Breakfast
On a sunrise walk on the boardwalk through the saltwater marsh at Huntington Beach State Park, I met this yellow-crowned night heron hunting fiddler crabs in the mud while the tide was out. The hungry bird snared one after the other, tossing them down its throat, so it’s a good thing the little crabs seemed endless in number. Taken in the summer of 2007.
The Light Finds the Queen
Awake Trixie is sweet and affectionate and playful. Asleep she sometimes sprawls down the length of my legs, but sometimes I can’t escape the feeling I’m living with royalty.
The Tree in the Stone
Natural artwork in the stone on a rainy winter’s morning on the Slate Trail at Cave Creek.
Big Needles
My award for the cutest member of the desert that will still stab you six ways from Sunday goes to the diminutive hedgehog cactus with its almost comically long needles. I found this little clump in the slate at Cave Creek on a rainy winter’s day. Rain, I remember rain. It was wet I think.
It Started Early
Emma waits for me to toss her a string early in 2008, not long after we adopted her. She never tired of playing with strings throughout her life. My camera at the time really struggled to focus on her in low light so I have a lot of slightly blurry pictures of her, but that’s better than none at all. This one is OK because I pre-focused and got lucky with where she placed her head.
Boolie 