Wildlife and Wild Animals

[Vaughn]

Long dead animals do hold still nicely...

Dead Bighorn Sheep, Zion National Park, 2018
5x7 Platinum/palladium Print
Eastman View No.2, Computar 210/6.3, TMax400
F32 at 1/30 second, Developed in Ilford PQ Universal Developer
Negative beached w/ Farmer's Reducer

My guess is that the sheep died further up the canyon. Neck was broken, but unknown if it was from a fall or when it wash washed down in the last thunderstorm (or from a predator). Did not look like it was scavaged at this spot.

I found it directly below this spot where I had set up the 5x7 earlier before making my way down.

[Heroique]

Long dead animals do hold still nicely. Dead Bighorn Sheep, Zion National Park, 2018.

Serves as a reminder of the Desert Southwest's harshness! The broken neck may be a sign of a cougar ambush near water, either upstream or here. Perhaps the same cougar watched you work by your tripod. I wish more forbidding images, like this one, accompanied the many others of canyon flowers in spring or golden cottonwoods in autumn. A beautiful and often hostile place.

[Vaughn]

Not enough bits and pieces laying around to make me think that it died here, but any good size thunderstorm flushes this creek. No maggots around. Back in the mid-90s I was exploring a tight narrow canyon in the same area. As I made my way back in, I came to more and more maggots...I declined to go further.

The way the body of the bighorn is draped over the edge of the creek was odd, and has some grace. The whole watershed of this drainage is this sandstone...petrified sand dunes, so to speak. I was out in this area during a downpour...the water pours off the mountains in sheets, and dry creeks come to life in a instant. Intense, not conductive to LF camera useage, but incredible. Saw several small herds/groupings of bighorn sheep walking over this terrain, with babes, too. Pretty cool.

I spent 12 seasons camping out in the Yolla Bollys -- never saw a lion, except once driving up the road to the cabin. The lions easily stay out of sight of a bunch of stinky trail builders! Now on my solo hikes...I guess it is cool that someone is watching over me and keeping the coyotes a tad more quiet. Its a lovely lonely place out there!

[Corran]

Five years later, another spider photo.

Sun Spider
Army Signal Corps Speed Graphic 4x5, Kodak Aero-Ektar 6" f/2.5, T-Max 100 dev'd in Pyrocat 1:1:100



I recently found a step-up ring that fit inside the lens to stop it down just a little bit - tested with a DSLR and seems to be about f/4. Sharpens everything up a little and gives a bit more DOF. This had a lot of tilt to bring the web into focus (somewhat). The disk of the sun becomes enormous when focused up close like this.