It sure feels like winter is over in Yellowstone.  Day time highs are warm, the snow is melting off the roads, most of the facilities in the park are now closed, and the remainder of the roads will close in a few days.   I haven't posted much lately so I thought I'd post a few photos to recap the winter.

Above is a bull elk near Blacktail Creek.  This guy was biggest of the six bulls hanging in this area.  The image was made with a Canon 5D Mk2 and a 500 mm lens.

This shot of a young moose peering around a tree was made in Silver Gate, just outside the Northeast Entrance.  I saw four moose there on this particular day.  I can't remember the equipment I used, but it was shot out the car window.

Above is a Golden Eagle seen in Lamar Valley.  This guy was actually just on the side of the road.  I looked away for just a second and the eagle flew off.  I hope the guy in the car in front of me got a shot of that.  Photo made with a Canon 50D and 500mm lens out the car window.

And lastly, another wolf from one of my lucky wolf encounters.  This was shot with a Canon 50D and 500mm lens.  I can't remember if I used a TC on this one or not.  Equipment was mounted on a tripod.

On a side note, my Europe trip has been cancelled, so I am taking orders as usual.  However, I'm not much in a position to take photos right now, so Photos of the Week for a couple of weeks will probably be older images.

The mid summer months can be a hard time to find and photograph wildlife.  When something cool is visible, there's often so many cars stopped that trying to get images can still be very difficult.  I often hear people say they haven't seen anything except bison, or maybe a few mule deer, and perhaps a few elk at Mammoth.  It's actually easy in July and August not to see anything and seeing something out of the ordinary takes some work.

One thing I always do is to follow up on tips.  However, wildlife rarely stay in the same spot for long.  Seeing a bear at Canyon today doesn't guarantee that it will be there tomorrow.  In fact,  unless there's a carcass, it will probably be long gone.  But when there is something to hold a particular animal in an area, such as a roadside carcass, then it may be worth investigating.  Of course, I use a carcass only as an example.  One should never approach a carcass, especially when it's evident that something has been feeding on it.  And I recommend avoiding searching for carcasses in the backcountry.  I had heard that the otters were back at Trout Lake this year, so I made three different trips.  As a result, I was able to get some nice otter shots that, if I hadn't have followed up, I would never have taken.

Another piece of photography advice I learned fairly quickly in Yellowstone is to always have a camera with me.  Even when it is July or August, you never know if you will come across something.  I learned this lesson by not having a camera with me several times when I could have had some nice shots.  I often joked that if I didn't bring my camera, then I'd see something cool.  Now I always carry it, even if I'm going to town.  This grizzly bear image was made on a road trip to Cody, WY.  As we drove along the East Entrance Road, this bear was seen.  Had I not had my camera, I wouldn't have been able to take this and the other photos I did.  So an outing that had nothing to do with photography ended up yielding a few nice shots.

Lastly, much of the mega fauna that everyone wants to see have typically moved into the high country, away from roads, to escape the heat and biting insects.  But there's still plenty of other critters to aim a lens at.  Marmots, pikas, mule deer, ducks, ground squirrels, and other critters can offer nice photo opportunities for those willing to see.  I saw this goldeneye at Trout Lake on one of my trips to photograph otters.  I was skunked on the otters but ended up spending a beautiful morning at Trout Lake with some friends and photographing a few ducks.  While I didn't get the otter shots I was after, I still came away with some nice images and had a good time talking to my friends.

Wildlife sightings are never guaranteed. I think that's one of the things that makes photographing them so challeninging and interesting.  Even if you have a lovely seen and beautiful light, you still can't make a nice wildlife image without the wildlife.  And when you have the animal, if you don't have nice light and interesting behavior, then there's still no guarantees.  July adds to those challenges with creatures being harder to find, but with patience, great images can still be had.

Here's some information from the Billings Gazette on a man that was gored by a bison at Bridge Bay Campground:

A California man was gored by a bison in a Yellowstone National Park campground Wednesday morning.

The 55-year-old man from Norco, Calif., was staying in Bridge Bay Campground near Yellowstone Lake. At about 11:30 a.m. he was taking pictures of a bull bison that was wandering among the campsites. When the two got to within about 10 feet of each other, the bison charged the camper.

The man received a puncture wound to the upper left thigh. He was treated at the Lake Clinic, then was transported by ambulance to St. John's Medical Center in Jackson, Wyo. His injuries are not considered to be life-threatening. The man's name was not immediately available.

The full article can be found here:  http://billingsgazette.com/news/state-and-regional/wyoming/article_1bf72186-7702-11de-b074-001cc4c03286.html

Wildlife sightings in the park continue to be slow.  The grizzly and moose last Saturday were fun to watch though.  I hadn't seen a moose at Sylvan Lake before, so that was a treat.  Here's an image.

Bear sightings this year seem to be few and far between.  I checked my notes from last year, and at this time, I had 67 sightings.  This year, at the same time, the number is 48. (those are individual bears, just sightings, which may be seeing the same bear(s) but on different days or in different places).  At first, I thought I was just having bad luck, plus I've been spending my photography time trying to photograph different species, but in talking with several other people, both park employees and regular visitors, they've reported seeing less bears too.  This is just my speculation, but I suspect it's due to a couple of reasons:  1) Last year was a harsh season for bears.  Late snows kept early season grazing to a minimum (though there were plenty of winter kill carcasses).  Then a bad autumn season for food sources compounded the issue.  I suspect many bears simply couldn't find enough food sources in 2008 to fatten up enough to survive the winter, so there are fewer bears in the park. The other result of the poor autumn food crop is the lack of cubs of the year.  With only a couple of exceptions, I haven't talked to many people who have seen young cubs.  Egg fertilization is based on the female's body fat, and if it's not high enough, she's not likely to become pregnant.  2)  Like last year, spring snow storms resulted in edible vegetation for bears to come up much later than normal.  The winter kill rate didn't seem as high, as there didn't appear to be as many carcasses as last year.  This makes sense, since it wasn't as harsh a winter.  But snows lingered, slowing down the "green up".  I suspect this moved bears from traditional feeding areas to other places which had "greened up" and where they were able to find food.  Anyway, this is all speculation with no data to back any of it up.

Other wildlife news:  The badger den in Little America (on the way to Lamar Valley), is gone.  I heard that a coyote took one of the young badgers.  As a result, the mother would have moved the remaining young to prevent the coyote from coming back and killing them too.

The injured cow moose near Trout Lake trailhead is no longer there.