Awakening

Mother Griizzly wakes up and wonders the snow covered landscape in the Rocky Mountains of Alberta. She's not far her from den at this point and I spent close to an hour watching her from a distance with my 800mm Nikon Lens

Family Tree

On a trip to the Khutzeymateen, I was on a Zodiak floating through the Estuary at the end of the inlet. I was able ( with the licensed guide) to observe the interactions of mom and 3 of her cubs. The 3rd is below and being more shy. All 3 were feeding from mom shorty after this photo was taken

Pre-Flight Ritual

Birds often perform movements that look like stretching before takeoff, and these can serve several purposes: Muscle warm-up: Flight requires a lot of energy and precise muscle control. Some birds do engage in movements that help warm up their flight muscles, especially after resting. Balance and positioning: They may adjust their posture to center their weight, check their footing, or align themselves for a smooth takeoff. Preening or feather adjustment: Before flying, birds often smooth their feathers to ensure they’re aligned for optimal aerodynamics. This can look like stretching or shaking. Alertness check: Birds are naturally cautious. Those movements might also be a way to scan their surroundings for predators before committing to flight. So while it may look like a stretch, it's more of a multi-purpose pre-flight ritual that helps them fly safely and efficiently. In this case, the Great Blue Heron

Spam

FYI - Today's front page of wildlife images appears to be largely spam for businesses in Melbourne Australia. --- Timestamp: 2026-05-04T13:48:38.536Z Page: https://photoclub.canadiangeographic.ca/feedback User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh; Intel Mac OS X 10_15_7) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/147.0.0.0 Safari/537.36

Red Winged Black Dragon

I've wanted to capture this shot for some time now and recently things finally lined up right for me to get it. The weather needs to be cool enough for the birds to see their breath and a clear sky helps with the morning sun to backlight the photo. The breath is seen when the birds lets out his song, so this is in essence, a visually representation of his song.

Ferocity and Feathers

On an old craggy branch covered in lichen, I catch sight of and stop to admire this Cooper's hawk preening. It runs one of its beautifully splayed tail feathers between its bill as I capture this intimate moment of self-care. Cooper's hawks spend a significant amount of time perched and preening, a vital self-maintenance behavior. It smooths the feather surfaces and "zips" together individual separated strands, which is crucial for maintaining aerodynamic function and efficient flight. It is amazing to observe how such a fierce hunter's bill, made for shredding prey, can be equally delicate.

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Shake it off

River otter emerging from under the ice.

Awakening

Mother Griizzly wakes up and wonders the snow covered landscape in the Rocky Mountains of Alberta. She's not far her from den at this point and I spent close to an hour watching her from a distance with my 800mm Nikon Lens

Family Tree

On a trip to the Khutzeymateen, I was on a Zodiak floating through the Estuary at the end of the inlet. I was able ( with the licensed guide) to observe the interactions of mom and 3 of her cubs. The 3rd is below and being more shy. All 3 were feeding from mom shorty after this photo was taken

Pre-Flight Ritual

Birds often perform movements that look like stretching before takeoff, and these can serve several purposes: Muscle warm-up: Flight requires a lot of energy and precise muscle control. Some birds do engage in movements that help warm up their flight muscles, especially after resting. Balance and positioning: They may adjust their posture to center their weight, check their footing, or align themselves for a smooth takeoff. Preening or feather adjustment: Before flying, birds often smooth their feathers to ensure they’re aligned for optimal aerodynamics. This can look like stretching or shaking. Alertness check: Birds are naturally cautious. Those movements might also be a way to scan their surroundings for predators before committing to flight. So while it may look like a stretch, it's more of a multi-purpose pre-flight ritual that helps them fly safely and efficiently. In this case, the Great Blue Heron

Spam

FYI - Today's front page of wildlife images appears to be largely spam for businesses in Melbourne Australia. --- Timestamp: 2026-05-04T13:48:38.536Z Page: https://photoclub.canadiangeographic.ca/feedback User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh; Intel Mac OS X 10_15_7) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/147.0.0.0 Safari/537.36

Red Winged Black Dragon

I've wanted to capture this shot for some time now and recently things finally lined up right for me to get it. The weather needs to be cool enough for the birds to see their breath and a clear sky helps with the morning sun to backlight the photo. The breath is seen when the birds lets out his song, so this is in essence, a visually representation of his song.

Ferocity and Feathers

On an old craggy branch covered in lichen, I catch sight of and stop to admire this Cooper's hawk preening. It runs one of its beautifully splayed tail feathers between its bill as I capture this intimate moment of self-care. Cooper's hawks spend a significant amount of time perched and preening, a vital self-maintenance behavior. It smooths the feather surfaces and "zips" together individual separated strands, which is crucial for maintaining aerodynamic function and efficient flight. It is amazing to observe how such a fierce hunter's bill, made for shredding prey, can be equally delicate.

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Shake it off

River otter emerging from under the ice.