Green River, Wyoming.

In October 2023 we headed out west on a short autumn junket to visit friends in Green River Wyoming. Fred Mast and his wife Ellen are gracious hosts and with Fred’s expert guidance, we can always expect to find beautiful places to photograph. Fred selected a perfect place for a Sunday drive in mid-October. Outside Green River is a road known to locals as Wild Horse Loop Drive. The 24-mile (38 km) self-guided tour winds through stunning high-desert landscapes and offers the chance to see wild horses in their natural habitat. On the day of our drive, we were not to be disappointed in seeing small groups of the descendants of mustangs brought to the region by Spanish explorers in the 16th century.

The scenic drive ascends to a high plateau and offers panoramic vistas of the vast desert below. Along the way, informational placards detail the surrounding landscape, this image featuring the prominent Pilot Butte. Though a dedicated road leads directly to the butte, it requires a suitable vehicle for the rugged terrain. Given our vehicle’s limitations, we opted to enjoy the beautiful view of the butte from the scenic highway itself.

Not far from the Pilot Butte placard, we spotted our first wild mustangs! The trio, seemingly a family with a young colt, grazed peacefully in the distance. The opening photo provides a closer view as captured through my Nikon D500 and Tamron lens at 250mm.

Standing at this vantage point, we can see the ridge carving a line between the parched lowlands and the desert highlands. Even in mid-October, the mountains wear their winter covering of snow, a stark contrast to the desert’s sun-baked palette.

At one point, a road with a steep dropoff leads to the town of Rock Springs. We chose not to take this route as the scenic drive provided a much less precipitous descent to the highway that led us to the city and our late lunch. After our meal, we headed back to Green River, a 20-minute drive on I-80 and a tunnel through a rock ridge separating the two small communities.

The views on the scenic highway are spectacular, especially where the roadway winds toward the edge of the high desert plateau. The journey’s many viewpoints provide lots of opportunities to stop and enjoy the natural desert beauty. At each stop, we hoped we might encounter a larger herd of wild mustangs.

Near the end of the drive, we spotted a larger herd. They were spread across a larger area than I could encompass in a single shot. Fred was driving and he elected to turn off the scenic drive to an unimproved road to get us a bit closer to the herd. I stepped out of the vehicle to capture a few shots. This image, captured at 110 mm with my Tamron lens allowed me to keep my distance to avoid scaring off the mustangs. Interestingly, the mustangs appeared completely unfazed by our presence and another vehicle that had followed suit. Their indifference provided a unique opportunity for observation and photography.

If you’re on I-80 and seeking a wildlife encounter, the Wild Horse Loop is a welcome scenic byway. Accessible from Rock Springs or Green River, this scenic detour offers a chance to witness wild mustangs in their natural habitat before rejoining the highway at the opposite city. Though the drive is paved, certain sections require caution due to loose gravel and potential wildlife encounters. Ensure your vehicle is suitable for such conditions before embarking on the adventure.

The scenic drive offers numerous pullouts and opportunities to soak in the scenery and unique wildlife at your own pace. Consider packing water, snacks, and comfortable shoes for exploring the area further.

My Flickr gallery also includes several extra images captured on our scenic drive. You can see all of the images above as well as the extras in 2K HD here.

John Steiner

This week, Anne of Slow Shutter Speed suggests we look around our neighborhoods to find the wildlife that coexists in our local environment. She writes, “From squirrels to birds, wildlife is around us. What non-domestic animals live in your neighborhood or nearby? Do you have feeders to attract wild birds? Look through your archives or take a nature walk with your camera. Maybe some of those flowers have bees looking for nectar with which to make honey? Lizards, praying mantis or spiders may be lurking around the rocks. Oh, how about butterflies? Let us see your wildlife.” You can read her entire challenge post here.

Stepping out of our condo in Fargo one day, I noticed the interesting spider in my opening photo. This is a common garden spider, a colorful species and harmless to humans. The web under construction was attached to the steel siding on our condo exterior wall. Anne can’t accuse me of not being close to home with this image. >grin<

Just across the river from Fargo, the community of Moorhead Minnesota is within minutes of our condo. While we do see geese in our neighborhood occasionally, on the other side of the river is a small pond. Across the street from the pond is a field that provides plenty of food. It’s not uncommon to see families of geese crossing the street to feed or to go back to the pond.

On my daily drive to the gym, I pass the campus of North Dakota State University. Right off my route on 12th Avenue North, a demonstration garden beckons. One Autumn day on my stop there, I found a chipmunk enjoying a snack.

On a spring day, I noticed a robin building her nest in the curve of a downspout by the main entrance to our condo. Over the next few weeks, I watched as the mother sat on the nest, and the father spent time on the ground not far from the nest. Soon, tiny open beaks would peek out, awaiting their mother’s nourishing meals. By June 6, the offspring were learning to fly and the two of them pretty much filled the nest. Not long after this image was taken, they would be gone off to raise their own families.

One day, while walking the trail through Orchard Glen Park in south Fargo, I saw a man and his young son sitting along the bank, each with their own fishing poles. As we walked by, the son looked in our direction and I gave him a North Dakota “Hi, how’s the fishing?” The kid jumped up and came over to tell me about the big fish they’d caught and released. Proud dad showed me the photo of his capture. He gave me permission to share the cellphone image here on my blog. You can view these images in 2K HD on my Flickr site here.

Thanks to Anne for this challenge. I had to think a bit and search through my images to pick only photos captured within a few miles of our home. We have a zillion rabbits around here, so many that I don’t bother to photograph them. We have a few wild turkeys and occasionally deer come into town, but I’m usually not around when I hear of a sighting. On a rare occasion, a moose might be seen, but they are quite rare in the city.

Next week, guest host Jude of Cornwall in Colors will be challenging us. If you’re new to these Lens-Artists challenges and would like to participate, here’s a link describing how you can join us.

John Steiner

Theodore Roosevelt National Park.

Over the years, I’ve had the opportunity to travel through the national park in North Dakota that was named after the 26th President of the United States. For a time, the President lived in my home state on a ranch near what is now his namesake park.

“I have always said I would not have been President had it not been for my experience in North Dakota,” Roosevelt once noted. He first arrived in the Dakota Territory to hunt bison in 1883. The young man from New York would have the future of our country forever changed by conservation policies that were borne of his legacy.

This post, however, isn’t about Teddy Roosevelt. It’s about the descendants of the wildlife that roamed the park when he lived in the area. I’ve gathered the largest gallery of images I’ve ever shared here featuring images of wildlife I’ve encountered while traveling through the park. The opening photo features a bison bull, cow, and calf. The bison bull can be identified by a large tuft of hair on the head and the horns curve upward. Cows don’t have the extra hair on the head, and though you can’t see it in this photo, the cow’s horns curve inward with the horn tips pointing at each other.

The second image features wild horses standing on the main road through the park. As you might imagine, cars stopped and people got out to take photos of these beautiful animals.

Another common resident of the park is the prairie dog. There are several “towns” in the park where these busy rodents entertain the child in all of us. They sit up on their haunches and “bark” at passers by. If you try to get too close, they will scamper down one of the many holes. Walking around a prairie dog town is an invitation to step in a hole or on a weak spot and end up with a broken ankle or worse.

Always remember, we are visitors to these magnificent animal’s home territory. Bison appear to be gentle giants, but they are known for being short-tempered, especially if they might be concerned for the safety of a calf. If you leave your car, keep your distance and stay near your vehicle in case they charge. At least 25 yards (22 m) is a minimum to keep you safe around these animals that can weigh 2,000 lbs (900 kg) and can run at more than 40 miles per hour (64 kph).

Those same 25 yards apply for elk, bighorn sheep, moose, and other large wildlife of the prairie. The bison, though, is by far the park’s most dangerous resident. The rising number of injuries to national park visitors has been shown to be related to the use of cell phones to take photographs. The short focal length of the typical cell phone camera entices people to move closer for a “better shot.”

A study at Yellowstone National Park, another home for the American Bison, tracked 21 visitors and 4 employees injured during the study period.

20 people, or 80 percent, actively approached bison before they were hurt.

5 people, or 20 percent, didn’t back away when bison approached.

15 people, or 60 percent, were hurt when in a group of three or more people who approached bison.

12 people, or 48 percent, were hurt while photographing bison.

6 people, or 24 percent, acknowledged they were too close to bison.

You can read more about the study here.

One of the advantages of moving to Flickr is that I can actually offer you a dynamic slideshow gallery. Though right now, I cannot automatically start the slideshow, I can show you how to do it.

Click on the bison thumbnail below to open the gallery of 30 photos. In the upper right corner of the gallery, you’ll see three icons:

To start the slideshow on the album page, simply click on the leftmost icon.

Alternatively, you can manually click on any image and then manually scroll through the gallery using the arrows on the left and right of each image. I hope you enjoy my views of wildlife in Theodore Roosevelt National Park.

Of course, you can get to the Flickr gallery by simply clicking on any image in this post where you can scroll left and right though the gallery as well.

John Steiner

As I am writing this post, the world is in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic crisis. We were lucky to complete our Southern Caribbean cruise in early February just as the world was awakening to the realization of the severity of the pandemic underway in Wuhan, China. As we boarded the ship, a special questionnaire was distributed along with our normal paperwork. Had we visited China in the previous two weeks? There were one or two more questions on the topic besides the usual questions about illness symptoms, but I don’t recall them. In any case, our cruise on the Carnival Conquest was without issue.

On our first trip to Belize, we chose an excursion that took us to the site of Mayan ruins, and then put us on the Belize River for a jungle wildlife cruise. The opening image features a male green iguana. That’s right, green iguanas are the typical species found in Belize. They can change coloration, males, like the one in this photo, often take on an orange hue. We saw plenty of them on the shore during our cruise down the river to the ocean.

The bus dropped us off at the jungle cruise “port” and while we waited, the captain brought our boat to the dock. The crewman and our tour guide (with the backpack) were getting ready to help us board. We were hoping to see wildlife, and we weren’t disappointed as you will see in the featured images. Where the river met the ocean, the captain gave us a high-speed (and rather bouncy) trip to the tender dock so that we could get back to the ship.

I took up a seat at the front of the boat and the crewman stood on the bow holding onto a rope. He was the wildlife spotter and he was good at it. As I was right up front with him along with my fancy camera, he made sure that I could see and photograph the wildlife he pointed out. He earned an extra large tip for his helpfulness. A baby crocodile was one of the first we could see. The captain maneuvered the boat in vain looking for mama croc, but she was not to be seen. This little guy was maybe a foot or so from snout to tail tip.

We did see full grown crocodiles, a couple of them, along the way, swimming along the surface, that dangerous mouth hidden underneath the water, protruding eyes looking for a meal.

In the trees, there were birds of many types, and we also saw howler monkeys. The monkeys were camera shy and the only decent photo I captured wasn’t able to capture his face. I elected not to share it.

As we headed toward open sea, that sharp-eyed crewman spotted a manatee. The captain took us near the light brown mass that was swimming close to the surface. I happened to capture the lone herbivore as the mammal brought nose to surface to take a breath. Combined with the visit to the Mayan ruins, this excursion is one of the highlights of the cruise. I submit for you, dear reader, a collection of images captured on the jungle cruise. As usual, if your browser supports it, you can click on an image to enlarge it and scroll through the gallery.

John Steiner

This week, Andrea Badgley focuses on drifters, nomads, and even the state of impermanence. “Where did it come from? How far did it travel? What stories would it tell if it could talk, and how long before it will move on again?” You can read the entire challenge post here. 

Though I enjoy photographing birds, both in flight and at rest, I am by no means an expert in the identification or even the skills required to capture these feathered transients. Sometimes I get lucky and find a bird in the wild, and sometimes, like in the opening shot, the bird is part of a raptor demonstration. In any case, these birds found themselves momentarily at rest in a location within reach of my lens. In many cases, moments after I captured their image, they were gone, off to find food or on to an adventure of which I know nothing.

The story about the photo above is one of my favorites. I spotted this Vermilion Flycatcher. Too far away and partially hidden by vegetation, he was barely visible to me. I waited, hoping he would move slightly in either direction so that I could get a clear image in my viewfinder. It was not to be. Moving on and leaving the lake shoreline, we began to cross a small clearing. A flash of red and black caught my peripheral vision and landed on a branch. I readied my camera, but just as quickly, he was gone. I don’t know if this was the same bird I saw at the lake, but fortunately, he flew across the clearing and came to rest on a tall tree stump. I grabbed a couple of quick photos, the first of which turned out to be out of focus. The second, pictured above, turned out quite well.

A few steps further along the trail, an older couple accompanied by a younger woman walked toward us on the trail. Obviously birders, equipped with cameras and binoculars, I suspected they would know the species. Excitedly I showed the image I’d captured to the older woman and asked if she knew the bird. She said it is a Vermilion Flycatcher and complemented me on the photo. She then told the younger woman that I got a really nice shot of the bird, and then explained that they have been trying to get a good shot of the bird for quite a while. The younger woman looked a bit disappointed when she came to realize that this novice was able to so easily capture what eluded them.

Though I may not know the names of all the birds in the gallery below, I submit for your review, a gallery of transient images of birds who momentarily landed in front of my lens.

John Steiner

Socorro County, New Mexico.

Last year I was introduced to the Bosque del Apache by my sister who lives in Albuquerque. The Bosque is a short 90-minute drive from Albuquerque. We spent part of a day there and had a great time capturing wildlife pictures. This year on our way back to Arizona, we stopped there again. This time I was equipped with a new camera and lens. I’ve used the Tamron 16-300 mm lens for some time with my D7000 Nikon DSLR and am pleased with its performance over the 18-270 Tamron it replaced.

This year, I purchased myself an early Christmas present, a Nikon D500. The reviews of this camera are all very positive and I must say they accurately reflect this amateur’s experience. For whatever reason, whether it’s the 20 MP sensor or better electronics in the camera, I swear the images from my 16-300 Tamron are sharper than they ever were on my D7000. At the end of this post is a link to my previous trip to the Bosque using the D7000 and 18-270 mm Tamron, and a link to my review post of the 16-300 lens.

This year’s visit to the Bosque coincided with the annual Festival of the Cranes. It is a celebration of the migration of the sandhill cranes to the Bosque. During the festival every fall, there is free admission to the Bosque and a much larger audience of visitors, most all of whom seemed to be carrying cameras with long zoom lenses, most much longer than my puny little 300 mm. I do have one advantage, though. The D500 has the smaller APS-C sensor. The smaller sensor adds a 1.5 factor to my 300 mm, making it the equivalent of a 450 mm lens on a full frame digital. Coupled with Lightroom’s ability to crop and still deliver a web-quality image for the blog, I got “close up and personal” with both snow geese and sandhill cranes.

The festival, held November 15-20, 2016 also featured some display tents with vendors selling everything from spotting scopes to telephoto lenses for your cellphone camera. Of course I had to stop at the Tamron and Sigma displays to check out their 150-600 mm long lenses. The only thing that held me back was the high price tag and the fact that I’m still recovering from the D500 purchase. Maybe next year Santa will be good to me again. We’ll see.

I promised a couple of links for you:

Last year’s gallery of images from the Bosque can be found here.

My review of the Tamron 16-300 mm lens can be found here.

The gallery of images below feature some of my favorite shots from this year’s trip to the Bosque. You may note some of the photos exhibit a pretty strong HDR effect. I do most of my shots in HDR these days, processed in Lightroom. I’m learning to use Nik’s HDR Efex Pro 2. Some of my HDR shots here are probably a bit “over-cooked”. I’m trying to learn how to make HDR Efex pro produce a more natural HDR, but sometimes I like the extra HDR “look” that Nik provides. I promise to use it sparingly as I prefer the more subtle HDR from Lightroom directly. But I digress… Click on an image in the gallery below to enlarge it and to scroll through the gallery.

John Steiner

I suspect this Sandhill Crane is thankful that he is not a turkey on this uniquely American holiday. This extra post is a sneak peek at an upcoming post featuring a trip to the Bosque Del Apache National Wildlife Refuge.

A note to my blogging friends: I have been remiss in keeping up with my reading. It normally takes three days for us to travel from North Dakota to Arizona every fall. This year, we took a total of eight days, the extra days filled with stops along the way to capture images for future posts. If you missed my usual comments on your posts, fear not… I will catch up.

John Steiner

Pronounced La Hoy-ah, this photographer who grew up in California was at least a dozen years old when I realized that La Jolla and La Hoya were the same place. OK, that may be a bit of an exaggeration, but not by much.

On the day we visited the Cove at La Jolla, I don’t know who had the greater population, the people or the birds. As it says on the La Jolla website, the water is calm and ecologically protected… Because the water is protected, surfboards, boogie boards and other flotation devices are not permitted.

 The wildlife is abundant at the Cove. This bull sea lion was barking menacingly at another bull who was encroaching on his space. Sea Lions, Harbor Seals, Leopard Sharks, Garibaldi, Brown Pelicans and Cormorants are just a few of the wide variety of wildlife that you will find in the protected waters of the cove. Yes, you can swim with the Leopard Sharks, if you can find them. This species of shark is elusive and harmless. Adults can reach up to 6 feet (1.8 m) in length, and in the spawning season, late summer to early autumn, pregnant females are attracted to the warm water to help them in their live birthing process.

Water sports are popular pastimes, but there are those, like myself and this gentleman, who prefer to walk along the shore, resting along the way and enjoying the views.

The Cove has interesting caves and tunnels where people and wildlife explore and enjoy.  Kayakers, snorkelers and scuba divers can get up close and explore the shoreline. The only negative thing I can say about the area is that the air is pungent with the smell of the sea and the large amount of wildlife, er, ah, shall we say, residue.

The furthest beach area in the image above is the Children’s Pool. The man-made cove is a great place to take the relatives and friends from out of town. The winter and spring are great times to view newborn seal and sea lion pups.

The gallery of images below features images captured on the day we visited La Jolla Cove. Click on an image to enlarge it and to scroll through the gallery.

John Steiner

Socorro County, New Mexico

One of our New Mexico stops on our way to Arizona this winter featured the winter home of thousands of migrating birds. Sandhill cranes, several varieties of geese, ducks, and over 350 other species of bird visit this 57,331 acre (232 sq. km) refuge that includes 3,800 acres (15 sq. km) of watershed on the Rio Grande flood-plane. The refuge is managed by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.

Roads ring the watershed, allowing visitors to view the wildlife from the comfort of their automobiles. In addition there are several hiking trails varying from less than a mile (1.6 km) to just under 10 miles (16 km). Be sure and check the website before you head out hiking as some trails may be closed, especially in the spring due to muddy conditions. Hikers need to bring plenty of water, especially in the summer months when temperatures can easily exceed 100 degrees F. (37 degrees C.)

Both Canada Geese and Snow Geese spend winters in the relatively warm New Mexico climate. On the website Friends of the Bosque, here, you can find the latest estimates of the numbers of common birds at the refuge. For example, as this is being written, the latest estimate for light geese (Snow and Ross’s) is 15,490. Over 12,000 ducks were estimated to be residing there. You can find other information about the bosque at the Friends site, as well as here, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service webpage.

I submit for your approval, two galleries. The first features some of the wildlife captured in my camera the morning we visited the Bosque. Click on an image to enlarge it and to scroll through the gallery.

Lately I have been experimenting with high dynamic range (HDR) software. My second gallery includes a small number of images that were post-processed into a single-image HDR. These images feature landscape shots of the Bosque.

John Steiner