Baby Bison – Northwest Trek

22. June 2012 · Comments Off on Baby Bison – Northwest Trek · Categories: Image a Day · Tags: , ,

The whole arrival of the new camera made me completely forget I still have some Northwest Trek pictures to post.  Add to that the fact that it’s been raining all day and I didn’t want to get wet!  So tonight’s image is a baby bison.

While on the tram tour we passed a herd of bison.  We actually went past them twice, the first time they were all lying down in the long grass and all my pictures brilliant depicted long stalks of grass with little black ears sticking out of the top!  Fortunately the second time we went past the bison they were up and about, in fact they were up and about in the middle of the road and the tram had to wait for them to get bored and walk off before we could go past.

The herd was pretty big, it must have had around 30 bison, and there where half a dozen babies.  While we were waiting for the bison to move off the road, one of the babies was drinking milk from it’s mother, it would have made a great shot but I would have had to shoot through the trams windscreen.  As the bison walked into the grass we slowly drove past.  I got the chance to grab this shot of a baby standing by a tree stump.  It’s mum was just in front and out of shot.

I was clearly over excited when I took the shot as I didn’t get the feet in frame.  But other bison kept walking between me and the baby so I guess I should be pleased I got this.  Actually forget other bison getting in the way, it was a bit of a fight to get a good shot in the tram as there were 14 other photographers trying to do the same thing.

The other reason I posted this tonight was that Abi said this was a really cute shot and she knows cute!

Carter discovered the joys of frozen cocktails – apparently they are really nice and today he stocked up.

Goat – Northwest Trek

13. June 2012 · Comments Off on Goat – Northwest Trek · Categories: Image a Day · Tags: , ,

Another picture tonight from Northwest Trek.  While there when we drove round the “free-range” area and came across three goats.  If you remember, the free-range area is 435 acres and we saw the goats several times.  We were driving around, and every time we hit a new corner, there was one of the goats again.

The guide told us that there were only three and I don’t know how many times we saw this one but we were out there 2 hours and saw them loads of times.  This image was taken at the base of a hill.  We were in the tram and the goat was at the top of the hill.  When we stopped to take a picture the goat just looked round, and this was the shot I got.

As you can see the weather was pretty crappy.  It was overcast like this for the whole tour, but at least it was dry.  Of course the moment we got to the end the clouds parted and the sun came out.  After tonight I’ll take a break from these Northwest Trek pictures and post more later, so tomorrow expect something different.

Tonight the halo guys decided to do a little wood shop.  They made a nice “Bird House”.

Raccoon – Northwest Trek

12. June 2012 · Comments Off on Raccoon – Northwest Trek · Categories: Image a Day · Tags: , ,

A Northwest Trek tour really has two parts.  You get taken around the 435 acre “free-range” area in a tram where you check out all the “safe” animals (the herbivores), and then you walk around what I guess you would consider a traditional zoo and check out the “dangerous” ones (the carnivores).

The tram ride is awesome.  The deer, moose and bison come right up to the tram and you get to see them in a way you never would in the wild.  The walking part though can be a bit of a disappointment.  I’ve visited Northwest Trek twice now and the carnivores really aren’t great.  This visit they were all hiding, we didn’t really see anything.  We stood in front of a large enclosure that said Grizzly Bear and all we could see was trees and bushes.  This same thing happened with the Black Bear, Bobcat, Cougar, Lynx, Wolf, Fox and Coyote.  We didn’t see any of them.

However there were a few animals on the walking tour we did see.  One of them was the raccoon.  There were two of them in a relatively small enclosure (always seems a little cruel to me) and they were very playful.  Interestingly none of these enclosures had bars, animals were separated from us by water or electric fences.  While this was good for us (nothing in the way) it seemed a little crappy for the animals.

Anyway the two raccoons were playing together (may have been fighting I don’t know – I’m no raccoon expert), they were climbing on some fallen trees and jumping on each other.  They move pretty fast so it was hit or miss if the pictures came out in focus and I took one fantastic pic with one of the raccoon’s hanging from a branch by one leg staring straight into the camera – but it wasn’t sharp enough to post.

In the end I liked the picture below.  This raccoon was posing almost to camera and stood still long enough for me to get this shot.  Would have been better if I had got the raccoon’s feet in too, but you can’t have everything.

Tonight the guys wanted to have a little party, they had some music, did a little dancing…

Elk – Northwest Trek

11. June 2012 · Comments Off on Elk – Northwest Trek · Categories: Image a Day · Tags: , ,

I thought tonight I’d post an animal shot from my weekend trip to Northwest Trek.  I wanted to post something impressive so I decided I’d start with a bull Elk.  These were amazing animals and are one of the largest species of deer in North America.  They live in and on the edge of forest land, live off plants, grass, leaves and bark and are native to North America and Eastern Asia.

The males (known as bulls) have large antlers, these are covered in a fine fur or velvet.  Some ranches in the US collect Elk antlers for this velvet and sell it in Asia where it’s used for medicine – in some cultures it’s considered an aphrodisiac – yuk.  The good news is this doesn’t hurt the Elk as they lose their antlers every year.

The tour guide taking us round told us that as the antlers contain blood which feeds the velvet and when the Elk start to rub their antlers against trees (or fight each other), they sometimes end up walking about covered in blood – sounds lovely!  The guide said it looks worse than it is – what I want to know is how does he know?  He’s not an Elk!

When the antlers fall off at Northwest Trek (they start growing in Spring and fall off in Winter), they are left on the floor as a number of animals (including Elk) chew on them.  Sounds disgusting I know but we were told they contain minerals the animals need.  We were also told that the Elk live in herd’s and the bull with the biggest antlers get’s all the cows (female Elk).

The one in this picture was looking pretty pleased with himself, and no matter what we did, he just stared, I suspect he was the dominant male and was keeping an eye on us.   The park had a pretty big herd and they are clearly used to visitors and just wander around the park.  You start to wonder after a while who is watching who.  There we were stuck in a small bus with no windows and the Elk had the run of the place.  Still pretty cool though.

Tonight Carter was left at home alone so he decided to play with his toys, I mean action figures!

Northwest Trek – Eatonville

10. June 2012 · Comments Off on Northwest Trek – Eatonville · Categories: Image a Day · Tags: ,

This morning (which is a Sunday – I don’t know when people will read this blog), I got up at 5:30am to drive to Eatonville in Washington with a photographer friend (Chris) to visit Northwest Trek.

Northwest Trek is a Wildlife Park for animals that are native to the Pacific Northwest.  So no Lions and Tigers, but definitely some bears – oh my!  The park offer a Photographers tour but you have to get there at 8am and it’s around 70 miles from where we live.  I’ve been before and remember the roads as being pretty crappy so we wanted to give ourselves plenty of time.

I picked up Chris at 6am, and at 7:10 we arrived.  I was well annoyed!  I mean I could have stayed in bed another 50 minutes!  That said we were not the first photographers there, and we were let into the park a little early.  In all there were 14 people on the tour and it started at 8am on the dot.

The wildlife park is 723 aches and was founded in 1971 by David and Connie Hellyer.  Dr. Hellyer purchased the original 500 aches for $4.95 an ache after a big fire damaged a lot of the woodland, and initially built himself a summer home.  In the early 1970’s he wanted to open a park to all but needed the backing of the state park.  In the end he gave away the land and even contributed his own money to pay for the parks opening.  Dr. Hellyer owned a house in the center of the park and stayed there for free until the day he died.

The photographer tour involved a Tram Tour around the 435 ache “free-range” area where all the herbivores live.  We drove around for two hours before the park officially opened stopping whenever we wanted taking load of pics.  I took over 900 and will be posting animal pictures for some time to come.  So lots of shots of bighorn sheep, bison, mountain goats, black-tailed deer, moose, Roosevelt elk, white-tailed deer, woodland caribou, barren-ground caribou, and trumpeter swans (in case you asked).

However I thought I’d start with a picture of the entrance to the park – here you go…

Carter and Master Chief have found a new way to relax, they call it Bitch ‘n Stitch.