The biggest struggle I have with nature photography is getting out to my location prior to sunrise. Like most people my biological clock tells me to stay in bed. On this day, I did exactly that. I was angry that I was still a half hour away from the place I intended to photograph as the sun was rising. Lucky for me I saw a dot in the middle of a pond beside the road as I flew by in a hurry to catch the last bit of the sunrise. Intrigued, I turned around to find a loon swimming around in the dense fog. For nearly a half hour I was able to sit back and enjoy watching this majestic bird dive under the surface to catch some fish. Sometimes sleeping pays off. This experience far surpassed the experience I would have had rushing around to get a landscape photo.
I spent most of the morning to get this shot. I carefully set up my camera under the birdhouse and then sat back at my car with the remote shutter and snapped away every time the parents would fly back to the nest. This was the fastest shutter speed I could get and the wings still are not in focus. These barn swallows are lightning fast.
For several years I have wanted to get a wild wolf in front of my lens. Honestly, I never expected it to happen any time soon. Luck never seems to be on my side when it comes to animals. I often find fresh tracks of wolves, cougars, etc, but never see the animal. That all changed while spending a morning in Banff with a friend. This wild, uncollared lone wolf wandered out onto the thin ice of vermillion lakes, paused for a minute or two and then vanished back into the bush after crossing the lake. After seeing a social media post of three radio-collared wolves crossing the same area less than a week ago, I hope it is a sign of a new pack re-establishing the area after the unfortunate demise of the pipestone wolfpack that has left a void in the area for several years.
