Christmas Present ~ a few thought on Christmas

By Daryl L. Hunter

Growing up as a child in America, as all children, I loved the Christmas season, the Christmas tree, lights, lawn decorations, candy, mistletoe, cookies, Santa Claus, elves, reindeer and most of all presents, it was a magical time of year.

It sure was a surprise at age 12 when I found out that Christ was the root word in Christmas, my secular home had never pointed out the connection. Today I remain more secular than anything else and I question myself, why do I get so flipping angry when ACLU types are trying to remove all vestiges of Christmas from the public square when I am not religious.

The answer must be, the homogenization of Christmas is just another symptom of the dismemberment of traditional American Culture, another victim of the Culture War, call me old fashioned but I liked the America of Christmas past, the time of the singular Scrooge. Today Christmas to me is a lot less about presents and more about turkey, tom and jerrys with friends, family and tradition, but embarrassingly with only a perfunctory explanation and observation of the meaning of Christmas to the kids.

When Christmas retailers insult the patrons of their biggest season by removing the Christmas greeting it makes me want to not buy, when I was told that a member of the Start Bus Board forbade the drivers from displaying the Merry Christmas programmed into their electric signs I was outraged, When Christmas trees became holliday trees I was apoplectic.

I have a hunch that the ACLU and their minions are offending more than just their sworn enemies, the Christian right. If their goal is “not to offend” it is a fool’s errand as it is an impossible task because to accommodate the 15% of Americans who are not Christian you have a remaining 85% at risk of being offended as an unintended consequence. If their goal is to offend, they have aspired to a goal they have a gift for achieving.

My hope is my 6 and 9 year olds find the magic in Christmas that I had the privilege to enjoy as a child; I hope it is still possible in this increasingly divisive and hostile social climate. As for me and many others I suppose, I have had a giant intangible stolen from me by the secular leftists of the ACLU and their Christophobe allies and my Christmas’s will never be the same.

All the people of the western world are going to have a Christmas on 12-25 of every year, most will have a day off from work whether they celebrate Christmas or not. It stands to reason that a Muslim, Jew or atheist would celebrate an extra day off so merry Christmas to you all.

------------------------------------

I originally wrote this in 2006 for my Column "And Rightly So" for a Jackson Hole newspaper "Planet Jackson Hole" but it is a Christmas tradition of mine to repost it every year here on my blog.

Huge Mule Deer Buck

Huge Mule Deer Buck, a photo by Daryl L. Hunter - The Hole Picture on Flickr.

These huge Mule Deer Bucks lay down in the sagebrush and you can't hardly see them, their antlers look like dead sage.

I have had the pleasure of photographing this great buck for three years, read the story on link below.

A Trophy Buck ~ through the years
daryl-hunter.net/a-trophy-buck-through-the-years

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"Shifty" By Chuck Yeager

"Shifty" By Chuck Yeager

Shifty volunteered for the airborne in WWII and served with Easy Company of the 506th Parachute Infantry Regiment, part of the 101st Airborne Infantry. 

  

If you've seen Band of Brothers on HBO or the History Channel, you know Shifty. His character appears in all 10 episodes, and Shifty himself is interviewed in several of them.

I met Shifty in the Philadelphia airport several years ago. I didn't know who he was at the time. I just saw an elderly gentleman having trouble reading his ticket.

I offered to help, assured him that he was at the right gate, and noticed the "Screaming Eagle," the symbol of the 101st Airborne, on his hat.

Making conversation, I asked him if he'd been in the 101st Airborne or if his son was serving. He said quietly that he had been in the 101st. I thanked him for

his service, then asked him when he served, and how many jumps he made.

Quietly and humbly, he said "Well, I guess I signed up in 1941 or so, and was in until sometime in 1945 ..." at which point my heart skipped.

At that point, again, very humbly, he said "I made the 5 training jumps at Toccoa, and then jumped into Normandy . . . do you know where Normandy is?"

At this point my heart stopped.

I told him "yes, I know exactly where Normandy is, and I know what D-Day was." At that point he said "I also made a second jump into Holland ,

into Arnhem ." I was standing with a genuine war hero ... and then I realized that it was June, just after the anniversary of D-Day.

I asked Shifty if he was on his way back from France , and he said "Yes... And it's real sad because, these days, so few of the guys are left, and those that are, 

can't make the trip." My heart was in my throat and I didn't know what to say.

I helped Shifty get onto the plane and then realized he was back in coach while I was in First Class. I sent the flight attendant back to get him and said that

I wanted to switch seats. When Shifty came forward, I got up out of the seat and told him I wanted him to have it, that I'd take his in coach.

He said "No, son, you enjoy that seat. Just knowing that there are still some who remember what we did and who still care is enough to make an old man

very happy." His eyes were filling up as he said it.

And mine are brimming up now as I write this.

Shifty died on Jan. l7 after fighting cancer.

There was no parade. No big event in Staples Center . No wall-to-wall, back-to-back 24x7 news coverage. No weeping fans on television.

And that's not right! Let's give Shifty his own memorial service, online, in our own quiet way.

Please forward by email to everyone you know. Especially to the veterans.

Rest in peace, Shifty.

Chuck Yeager

"SHIFTY" - an incredible American hero!

SHIFTY DIED JAN 17, 2011..........May God rest his soul.

Please do me a favor and pass this on so that untold thousands can read it.

We owe no less to our REAL heroes....

--------------------------------------

Copied from e-mail I received, I don't think Chuck will mind

Let's avoid the blame for fiscal cliff

OK, first of all I am a very conservative voter who considers himself a conservative RINO. I vote republican because I won’t ever again vote for an independent that will take a vote away from the republican candidate.

That said: I think the argument can be made that we should let the taxes go up on high income earners only if we exclude S corporations. It is small business that we are trying to protect. When democrats cry about this one, their hypocrisy can be exposed. It will suck for the high-income individual, but I don’t think this will hurt the economy much; most in that income category pay most of their taxes in capitol gains anyway.

The democrats won’t separate the S corporations from individuals because they want this move to be a surreptitious tax upon middle-class business owners, yes we must protect these entrepreneurs. I would hope that if we let this tax go up to 39% on high earning  “INDIVIDUALS” and excluded S corporations that our smarter constituents would understand this tactic if sold properly.

The concept of cutting taxes to increase revenue is impossible for the stupid to understand.  The democrats cater to the stupid, lie to the stupid, then mobilize the stupid against us. Tough luck for the USA that the uninformed have an equal vote as the informed.

In a perfect world I’d like to hold our ground, and we could, but since a majority of the American public is proven themselves stupid and gullible, I think without throwing the gullible a bone it will kill us in 2014 and 2016 if we leave ourselves open to be blamed for being unreasonable. I think it would be reckless politics to take the blame for us going off the fiscal cliff.

Crop-Factor Myth – misconstrued misnomers and disseminated confusion.

Are we confused yet? Many of us with a foundation from the photography of yesterday seeking an understanding of a new paradigm of digital photography have been unintentionally misled. With the switch from film to the original camera sensors we had to get a new understanding of our equipment both new and old. The first digital camera sensors as well as most sensors today recorded an image on a smaller recording surface than the 35mm film image of yesterday. Our images shot with wide-angle lenses of our film days no longer appeared to be wide-angle images. Our telephoto lens images appear to have more magnification. Yes, this was disconcerting so we attempted to understand. Well meaning camera techno geeks explained in terms intended to simplify concepts but only confused. To make matters worse, in the quest to explain, misleading explanations have misinformed those who have never put a film camera to their eye so incorrect construal of Crop-Factor conception is universal as old hands shared bogus information to those who had never known film.

Rest of article with accompanying explanatory graphics

An Indian Buffalo Hunt for Yellowstone

By Daryl L. Hunter

One brisk fall morning before sunrise I set off from my camp outside Gardiner Montana to photograph elk at Swan Flats in Yellowstone National Park. Up before the coffee shops opened I was swizzling my second can of iced Starbucks Double Shot while Ian Tyson’s “The Gift” blared from my speakers as I enjoyed the predawn glow on the Hoodoos south of Mammoth as I wound my way up the mountain.

s
Buffalo grazing at Mud Volcano

Eagerly anticipating a great day of wildlife photography, upon cresting the hill at Golden Gate just past Rustic Falls, to my surprise I saw three tepees pitched east of the road along Glen Creek. As I surveyed the scene for photo opps I noticed up ahead, crossing the road, a band of Indians, horseback, in buckskins, packing quivers of arrows and carrying spears. Cool, this must be a movie set but where is the film crew.

I hurried down to the nearest turnout so I could photograph them as they moved trough Swan Flats as the light crept down the face of Electric Peak to the west. As I was setting up my tripod, to my delight and surprise the indians broke into a gallop chasing a small herd of bison who moments before were peacefully grazing but now were running for their lives........................................................................Rest Of Story

Great Horned Owlet

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Great Horned Owlet
Originally uploaded by Daryl L. Hunter - The Hole Picture

Grizzly Bear sow and cub

Grizzly Bear sow and cub
Originally uploaded by Daryl L. Hunter - The Hole Picture

Grizzly Bear sow and cub, Grand Teton National Park

Greater Yellowstone ~ Window on Wilderness

My video and photography travels from 2001 around the Greater Yellowstone Region where I had the opportunity to film nesting Bald Eagles, fighting Bighorn Sheep, Wolves hunting elk, elk making friends with grizzlies, frolicking grizzly bear cubs etc.

Jackson Hole Wolf Drama

JACKSON WYOMING – On a cold and snow day two miles north of Jackson Wyoming in the valley called Jackson Hole a wildlife drama played out right above the highway that travels between East Gros Ventre Butte and the National Elk Refuge.  This spot was conveniently located right above a large turnout that rapidly became a busy hub of activity for Jackson Hole photographers, wildlife enthusiasts, and distracted skiers who wanted to witness one of nature’s life and death dramas that are usually only available to many on Net Geo Wild and other programming on TV.

On the butte about a hundred yards off the highway, a black wolf was harassing a mule deer buck that had already lost his antlers but still proved far from defenseless. For two days, the wolf would make aggressive moves at the buck. The buck having wisely chosen brilliantly defendable positions to maximize his survival refused to be a pushover meal for this voracious predator.

To many spectators it appeared the wolf was playing cat and mouse with the buck because the wagging tail and the playful nature of the wolf, he did appear to be having a great old time. But I, the skeptic believes the wolf was enjoying what I believed to be a tactic of harassment and attrition, the wolf hoping the buck would wear out and lose his will to fight on.

The buck would find a relatively flat spot where he could face the wolf were behind him would be a drop off where the wolf couldn’t come up from behind or if another wolf joined the other they would both or all come from the same direction. Here, the buck would catch some restless rest between assaults from the wolf.

As the standoff played out the wolf received several good examples of what a sharp front cloven hoof feels like when applied to the head and body and, the wolf’s respect for the buck grew exponentially after each successful whack.

For those who thought it was a game for the wolf I think my video tells a different story. When the buck attacks the wolf seems to be quite head shy because of lessons learned the hard way yet intermittently he continued his assaults.

The wolf from time to time would rest and snooze as did the buck, the deer probably less restful than the wolf. The wolf would also leave now, and then I assume to go eat some field mice to hold him off for what I assume he thought would be his main course. When the wolf would leave the buck sometimes would search around the butte for a more defensible position and get a bite to eat. The wolf would return to where the buck had been then sniff out his new position, and the harassment would start anew.

As the buck gained confidence from the new respect paid by the wolf, the buck would move a short distance from his rampart defenses to eat but always on the lookout for a change of behavior of the wolf so he could rapidly refresh the wolf’s memory of his powerful hooves as he moved back to his defensible position.

Many believed the wolf was a young one just trying to learn his trade and this may be so because after two days effort the wolf departed and left the buck to fight another day, and hopefully next year in October this buck can once again become photo fodder for my camera.

Wolves - Images by Daryl Hunter

Wildlife, Landscape, Lifestyle Photos - The Hole Picture

Portfolio - Daryl L. Hunter - Images by Daryl HunterPhoto Gallery of Daryl L. Hunter  - The Hole Picture

Daryl L. Hunter is a Photographer/Writer/Publisher based in the Greater Yellowstone Region

When I was a wander lusting young man I would often find myself in beautiful places, so I bought a camera so I could document my wanderlust.

1n 1987 I packed up my Toyo 4X5 view camera, Pentex 6X7 medium format camera, and my 35-millimeter cameras and headed to Jackson Hole Wyoming, one of the best places on earth to be an outdoor photographer. 

Jackson Hole is full of active lifestyle types, fly-fishing, hunting, whitewater sports, horseback riding, etc.  I became a freelance guide as well, fly-fishing, snowmobile, park tour guiding, and horseback wrangling my way to beautiful pictures all over the area and throughout the spectrum of activities in the area.

Jackson Hole abuts Yellowstone National Park and Grand Teton National Park an embarrassment of riches for wildlife and scenic photography.

My freelance photography bifurcated to include graphic design work, which opened the door to web publishing requiring that I learned to write. I publish  The Greater Yellowstone Resource Guide.

My photographs have been published by National Geographic, Outside Magazine, Snow Country, Outdoor life, Esquire Sports, West Coast Board Sailor, Warren Miller Productions, U.S.A. Today, San Francisco Magazine, Mother Jones, Yes Magazine, Mule Deer Foundation Magazine, International Wolf Magazine, Toyota, Fly-fisherman, Beet (Belgian fishing magazine) and Fit For Fun (German sports Magazine).

I am proficient with small, medium, large format photography. As a stock photographer my photos have been used in hundreds of brochures, rack cards, newspapers, and websites promoting the Greater Yellowstone area and beyond. Today I shoot exclusively with my Canon EOS D5 Mark ll, its 21-megapixel censor can produce Tiff files of 60 megabytes, a size that can reproduce very large prints, or provide the opportunity for cropping tight and still having plenty of resolution to work with.

I have been working with Photoshop extensively since 1995 and am proficient with photo manipulation and montage. Today my photo management system is Aperture by Apple; it is superb at color correction with the added benefit of photo database management.

Education: Independent study of photography and digital design:

Photography has more pay offs than monetary. It drives us to search out pretty places or to dissect our surroundings to find it where we are. It makes us seek out beautiful things even in adverse conditions. Wherever we go we are looking for a beautiful rectangle we can isolate out of the chaos of life, when you are always seeking beauty, you will find more than your share - that is rich. 

Daryl L. Hunter and Dogteam at Alaska's Hatcher Pass

Daryl L. Hunter and Dogteam at Alaska's Hatcher Pass
Originally uploaded by Daryl L. Hunter - The Hole Picture

Me and my dog team on Hatcher Pass in Alaska in 1978. Mushing dogs in Alaska is one of the funnest things I have ever done. I wanted to run the Iditarod but I never could get enough money or dogs to do it. While there I became friends with several of the guys that started it.

Alaska was a blast becasue of the spirit of the people. Everyone was either young and adventurous or old and adventurous. I hear that since I left this dynamic has changed some but back in the 70's it was quite an experience.

My mom took this shot with a point and shoot and printed it on that crappy mat paper. I scanned it and it is hideous but with some noise reduction and creative bluring it is nearly acceptable.

© Daryl L. Hunter - The Hole Picture - Stock Photography for the Yellowstone region.
I also publish The Greater Yellowstone Resource Guide. I also lead "The Hole Picture Photo Safaris
Photos For Sale Buy Prints Here

Obamacare Abominations - by John Stossel

By John Stossel

President Obama says his health care "reform" will be good for business.

Business has learned the truth.

Three successful businessmen explained to me how Obamacare is a reason that unemployment stays high. Its length and complexity make businessmen wary of expanding.

Mike Whalen, CEO of Heart of America Group, which runs hotels and restaurants, said that when he asked his company's health insurance experts to summarize the impact of Obamacare, "the three of them kind of looked at each other and said, 'We've gone to seminar after seminar, and, Mike, we can't tell you.' I think that just kind of sums up the uncertainty."

Brad Anderson, CEO of Best Buy, added that Obamacare makes it impossible to achieve even basic certainty about future personnel costs:

"If I was trying to get you to fund a new business I had started and you asked me what my payroll was going to be three years from now per employee, if I went to the deepest specialist in the industry, he can't tell me what it's actually going to cost, let alone what I'm going to be responsible for."

You would think a piece of legislation more than a thousand pages long would at least be clear about the specifics. But a lot of those pages say: "The secretary will determine ..." That means the secretary of health and human services will announce the rules sometime in the future. How can a business make plans in such a fog?

John Allison, former CEO of BB&T, the 12th biggest bank in America,....................rest of article

------------------------------------------------

My liberal friends fail to understand this logic and fear from the business community!

dh

Christmas Present

Christmas Present

By Daryl L. Hunter
Growing up as a child in America, as all children, I loved the Christmas season, the Christmas tree, lights, lawn decorations, candy, mistletoe, cookies, Santa Claus, elves, reindeer and most of all presents, it was a magical time of year.

It sure was a surprise at age 12 when I found out that Christ was the root word in Christmas, my secular home had never pointed out the connection. Today I remain more secular than anything else and I question myself, why do I get so flipping angry when ACLU types are trying to remove all vestiges of Christmas from the public square when I am not religious.

The answer must be, the homogenization of Christmas is just another symptom of the dismemberment of traditional American Culture, another victim of the Culture War, call me old fashioned but I liked the America of Christmas past, the time of the singular Scrooge. Today Christmas to me is a lot less about presents and more about turkey, tom and jerrys with friends, family and tradition, but embarrassingly with only a perfunctory explanation and observation of the meaning of Christmas to the kids.

When Christmas retailers insult the patrons of their biggest season by removing the Christmas greeting it makes me want to not buy, when I was told that a member of the Start Bus Board forbade the drivers from displaying the Merry Christmas programmed into their electric signs I was outraged, When Christmas trees became holliday trees I was apoplectic.

I have a hunch that the ACLU and their minions are offending more than just their sworn enemies, the Christian right. If their goal is "not to offend" it is a fool's errand as it is an impossible task because to accommodate the 15% of Americans who are not Christian you have a remaining 85% at risk of being offended as an unintended consequence. If their goal is to offend, they have aspired to a goal they have a gift for achieving.

My hope is my 8 and 11 year olds find the magic in Christmas that I had the privilege to enjoy as a child; I hope it is still possible in this increasingly divisive and hostile social climate. As for me and many others I suppose, I have had a giant intangible stolen from me by the secular leftists of the ACLU and their Christophobe allies and my Christmas's will never be the same.

All the people of the western world are going to have a Christmas on 12-25 of every year, most will have a day off from work whether they celebrate Christmas or not. It stands to reason that a Muslim, Jew or atheist would celebrate an extra day off so merry Christmas to you all.

------------------------------------

I originally wrote this in 2006 for a Jackson Hole newspaper "Planet Jackson Hole" but it is a Christmas tradition of mine to repost it every year here on my blog.

Maybe with some additions ~

The following was written by Ben Stein and recited by him on CBS Sunday Morning Commentary.

I am a Jew, and every single one of my ancestors was Jewish. And it does not bother me even a little bit when people call those beautiful lit up, bejeweled trees, Christmas trees. I don't feel threatened. I don't feel discriminated against. That's what they are, Christmas trees.

It doesn't bother me a bit when people say, 'Merry Christmas' to me. I don't think they are slighting me or getting ready to put me in a ghetto. In fact, I kind of like it. It shows that we are all brothers and sisters celebrating this happy time of year. It doesn't bother me at all that there is a manger scene on display at a key intersection near my beach house in Malibu . If people want a creche, it's just as fine with me as is the Menorah a few hundred yards away.

I don't like getting pushed around for being a Jew, and I don't think Christians like getting pushed around for being Christians. I think people who believe in God are sick and tired of getting pushed around, period. I have no idea where the concept came from, that America is an explicitly atheist country. I can't find it in the Constitution and I don't like it being shoved down my throat.

Snow Birds

YELLOWSTONE  - As winter settles in on the Greater Yellowstone Region, the snowbirds fly south either by wing or by motor coach. Those of us that are more grounded either by work, will, finance, perverse adrenalin addictions or a slavish dedication to the four seasons settle in and prepare for the curses and blessings of winter.

I grew up in San Luis Obispo California, where the weather hardly changes. In spring it greens up, in summer it turns brown again until February but the temperature rarely dips below 60 degrees and if the water in the garden hose freezes it is a talking point between neighbors. In summer, the thermometer rarely breaks 85 degrees. For many it is the perfect place.

When I was a teenager, I found out San Luis Obispo County was a tourist destination, and nothing could have surprised me more. How could that be, this place is so ordinary? I know, I had all the wisdom of a teenager! As a young adult I moved around a lot, all over California and Alaska, no moss grew under my feet as I lived as the metaphorical rolling stone. I sampled many places before the Greater Yellowstone captured me and wouldn’t let me go. I later concluded my wanderlust was satiated by the change of seasons and my wandering must have been an escape from the drudgery endlessly good weather.

Living in Alaska as a dog musher I decided I liked winter better than summer, which was when my sport of choice occurred, besides there was no mud nor mosquitoes during winter. My preference for winter continued when in my thirties when I moved to Jackson Hole, in the Greater Yellowstone, a skiing nirvana.

As I remained in the Greater Yellowstone season after season year after year, I learned I loved to see each season come, and I love to see each season go. As a photographer I marveled  how the landscape changes every several months and brings a new variety of subjects to my lens. Every season has its primary focus.

Springtime is for grizzly bears as this is the time when it is easier to find them. It is also time to photograph the landscape coming back to life from its long winter slumber. Summer is alive with leafy greenery, summer thunderstorms that bring drama to our landscape, and baby animals fill us with the awe of cute. Fall brings the drama of the breeding season of the mega fauna, elk, deer, moose etc, magnificent creatures fighting for the right to perpetuate their species.

In winter many mountain top dwellers come down to the valleys for the winter so we can get a look at them. Deep snow drives the bighorn sheep, elk, mountain goats etc. to the lower elevations where it is easier to paw their way through the snow for a bite to eat.

Me out enjoying a fresh blanket of snow.

Winter also brings that beautiful blanket of snow. At the beginning of my first winter in Alaska I looked out at the snow covered landscape in a spot where it was valley and no mountains, As I looked I wondered, here we have the dull green of the trees, the white of the snow and the blue of the sky, why is this so pretty. My conclusion was despite the paucity of color or towering mountains the snow-covered landscape smoothed out all the rough edges and softened the look of everything bringing a pleasing ambiance that was different than the one before.

I’m older now and that snow shovel is heavier than it used to be. My driveway seems to have grown as exponentially long as my property tax bill large. Unfortunately, a snow blower costs about the same as a new lens and my propensity to never make my life easier, I always buy the lens or some such thing instead of the snow blower.  Skiing has less appeal as my agility leaves me short of what I once could do.

After moving away from my hometown I learned of its appeal as it is a stunning place, but sometimes you have to back away from something before you can see it.  I no longer prefer winter to summer, and I do play with the idea of a winter escape to southern Utah or northern Arizona. But, since I have neither wings nor a motor coach I will remain here with the less mobile and hole up like the grizzly bear except with frequent forays to capture the beauty that remains constant unlike the ambulatory mentality of man.

Yellowstone Pine Marten

Greater Yellowstone Pine Marten or American Marten To By Pine Martin photos go to The Hole Picture Photo Gallery

Life is full of surprises; you will rarely find a grizzly bear photographer as thrilled as when they get the opportunity to photograph a Pine Marten or long tail weasel during the course of their pursuit of photographing grizzlies. Grizzlies are easy for them to find, to get the opportunity to photograph a Pine Marten or a weasel it is a rare event.

Greater Yellowstone's American Marten or Pine Marten as they are colloquially know around here is a North American member of the family Mustelidae (Martes americana). The name "Pine Marten" is derived from the common but distinct Eurasian species of Martes.

Pine Martens are cat-size and slender with long, dark, chestnut-brown fur and a bushy tail with a distinctive creamy-yellow throat. The tail is long and fluffy and is about half the length of its body. Their head is usually lighter in color than the rest of their body it has large rounded ears, a roughly triangular head and sharp nose. A big male American Marten will be 20 or so inches long and weigh around two to three pounds. Compared to other carnivores, Pine Marten population density is low for their body size.

Young Martens or kits are born around April. They will each adult size about three to four months of age although they don't really mature until they are about two years old. The mother will have two to three kits each time she has her babies. When they are born, the kits are naked, blind, and deaf. Life span: may reach 10 years or more in the wild...................................................................rest of article

Jackson Hole's National Elk Refuge

Jackson Hole's National Elk Refuge

Bull Elk herd, National Elk Refulge, Jackson Hole Wyoming

When the sun peaks over the Gros Ventre Mountains east of Jackson Hole, and its light creeps slowly across valley, light creeps over bundles of fur and antlers starting to stir from a cold winter night. As the sun reaches the base of the Grand Teton, orange and yellow light bathes the landscape and 6,000 wintering elk. By ten o'clock, adventurous visitors braving the winter cold venture out on the refuge in horse drawn sleighs to get an up close view of these majestic animals.

In the pre Columbian area elk ranged from the eastern states through central and western North America. They grazed the open prairies, mountain valleys, and foothills. As settlers pushed slowly westward, the distribution of the elk was rapidly reduced to the western mountains. By 1900, elk had disappeared from more than 90 percent of their original range.

When settlers arrived in Jackson Hole and homesteaded the valley in the 1880s, there may have been as many as 25,000 that wintered here. Establishment of farms and ranches displaced the elk from the traditional wintering areas and livestock competed for winter food, and hungry elk raided haystacks. The ranchers had to kill the elk if they wanted to stay in business.

In the early 1900s, severe winters with deep, crusted snow also took a serious toll on the wintering elk. In 1909 the ranchers and town folk of Jackson Hole appealed government to fund some land and a feeding program too save the diminishing elk herd. The refuge was created in 1912 as a result of public interest in the survival of the Jackson elk herd on about 1200 acres. The government has added to it over the years and today the Refuge consists 24,700 acres and is some of the last remaining elk winter range for the Jackson Hole Elk Herd. Prior to1916 Refuge was dotted with over 44 homesteads.

The refuge continues to preserve much of the remaining elk winter range in the valley, approximately one-quarter of the original Jackson Hole winter range. Elk stay on the refuge for approximately six months each winter.

Rest of article and more elk info

A few thoughts on Photography

As the sun turns out the lights on another day a central coast surfer makes good use of the last bit of daylight to find the perfect wave to propel himself home. As he watched wave after wave to pick the ones he wanted I wonder if he was cognizant of the outstanding optical phenomena going on all around him. For the surfer it is probably just another sunset, for the visiting photographer it is panoply of subjects on parade in front of the lens.

I wanted to take pictures of the evening light reflection in the wet sand of low tide so I slung my 500mm setup over my shoulder and set my short telephoto setup on the tripod and headed down the beach just shortly before sunset. I was constantly switching between the two. The 500 I would hand hold but I would use the arm on the tripod for a handy and quick support.

I would shoot couples walking and riding bicycles down the beach, I’d shoot them wide then switch to the 500mm. I’d shoot the grand scenic wide then wait for the mobile silhouette to move into the proper place. No shortage of subject matter here.

I moved to Jackson Hole Wyoming from California in 1987 because all the things I wanted to shoot were in the mountains and California's mountains were too crowded and although I spent much time living at the beach what I saw there was no longer special. I enjoyed the grand scene but the ebb and flow of fantastic photo fodder was lost on me.

It is amazing to me how even now I ignore what is right out my window because something better is 100 miles down the road where the grass is greener. The beautiful ubiquity around me shamefully I rarely see.

Yes I get plenty of good stuff in my area but I do feel like a slacker when I look at what my visiting photog buddies like Jeff Clow, Stephen Oachs, Jerry Patterson etc. produce in a short window of time on their visits. They as visitors with a limited window of time have to look closer and do a better job of “seeing” to make good use of their time. Consequently when I look at what they produce in my back yard it opens my eyes to some of what I have driven past of failed to seek out.

Weird Wildlife Behavior

Grizzly Bear Sow 610 of Grand Teton National Park had been chasing these elk and has been eating their calves for days yet these elk do much more than tolerate her presence.

Grizzly 399 and 610 - Grand Teton's famous roadside bears‎

399 and her new batch of cubs getting ready to cross the road in Grand Teton National Park. Print For Sale

GRAND TETON NATIONAL PARK - Beloved and famous Grand Teton Grizzly Sow 399 and new set of triplet cubs made their debut on June 5, 2011 to the delight of many, but especially to Jackson Hole and Yellowstone's cadre of wildlife photographers like myself. 399 the four-hundred-pound grizzly acquired her unimaginative moniker in 2001 when, as a five-year-old sow, she was trapped and fitted with a radio collar so researchers could track her. Bear 399 was born to a mother who had no history with the legendary Yellowstone Grizzly Bear Study Team that tracks bears across the landscape.

During the summer of 2004, 399 emerged from her den with a single cub, but the cub disappeared. It is assumed it had a deadly encounter with an adult male grizzly which are known to kill cubs. Male grizzlies are the greatest treat to cubs, as female grizzlies will not come into heat as long as they are nursing cubs.

In late November of 2005 she denned up in the Teton Wilderness north of Grand Teton National park for hibernation. The following spring, she emerged with three new cubs in tow. Almost immediately, the sow and cubs drew large crowds. They became a sensation unlike any Grand Teton Park grizzly in modern memory. ..........................rest of story