Lonely

Posted by Florian – July 7, 2009

It is been a while since you have heard from me. After waiting for weeks for the weather to improve it suddenly all came together. We headed out on the arctic aerial expedition for the freedom to roam project. I am still in the middle of the whole adventure and just landed at Point Lonely. So how in the world would I have internet access? Point Lonely is a former Airforce Radar site. We had seen the landing strip as we had flown the coastline a few days before and took the opportunity at this point to “sit” the plane down and wait for the weather  and especially light to improve.We had no idea about what to expect or if even anyone was around. But quickly s.o. emerged from the bright red tower building and we were greated by a very nice foreman who turned out to be a bird biologist.  The entire camp is being disassembled and a lot of contaminated soil removed by a special crew.  We sat down in camp and learnt lots of interesting stories about birds and especially polar bears wondering along the coast. 

Anyway, this is the long story behind the reason why I have a few minutes of internet in the middle of nowhere – at Point Lonely. And it is the same story of just having a few moments. Over night the fog rolled in. Now I have to be on “standby” to be ready to jump into the plane any moment the fog will give us the chance to take off. If we cannot, I might have the chance to write for the coming hours (or days) about my experiences.

What I want to share with you in short: I have seen a Arctic landscape come alive with hundreds of thousands of caribou, watched wolves chase across the tundra, thousands of seals on the ice-sheet and a lonely polar bear wonder the pack ice. As we were buzzing along with the plane it sometimes was hard to absorb and process all the impressions right that very second. I am so glad to have the images to come back to, where a single moment is frozen in time. It will give me a chance to understand what ALL I have seen. My expedition is coming to an end in a few days and after a quick edit, I will share with you some of the incredible moments I have witnessed. For now I better step outside and see what the fog does ……..

Freedom to Roam featured in OP

Posted by Florian – June 29, 2009

Outdoor photographer highlights Freedom to Roam II – B2B 

The July issue of Outdoor Photographer has a wonderful story on my ongoing Freedom to Roam project on North America`s western seabord from Baja California to the Beaufort sea (B2B) in the arctic. The article gives a great overview of my conservation photography project focusing on wildlife corridors. Take a look at the magazine to see the images in print and read the great story OP has put together in their series on the environment!

Get the July issue of OP to see the story in Freedom to Roam II in print

Got patience ??? – 72 hours in a blind!

Posted by Florian – June 26, 2009

Patience

.. is undoubtably one of the most important tools in wildlife photography. While sometimes it seems one may be waisting ones time, I have learned that if one give into the waiting game, animals start to present themselves: You discover a little birds nest nearby, you observe a fox that does its daily round to mark its territory – and if you are lucky the moment you are waiting for may come true. Some of the best images in my career happened after such long hours of waiting. 

Snowy Owl returns to the nest to feed the female and chicks. Nikon D3, 500mm/f4 AF-I

After 72 hours this was won of the “golden” moments that made all the waiting worth while. Emil and I had scoped out a good nesting location of the snowy owls. It was a great Lemming year and there were many active nests near the town of Barrow in the northern most tip of Alaska. After acquiring permission to set up a blind the waiting game began. 

Wishful thinking

While I can loose my patience quickly with stuff that “unnecessarily” takes a long time, I can have the patience of an elephant after I get “hocked” on the idea of an image. Often I make different scenarios up in my mind. It becomes a collection of imaginary moments of whishful thinking. These thoughts nourish my desire to wait for those moments to materialize. 

Believe me. There are many times when I have waited for nothing. But the times when a wonderful image came out of it make the wait all worth it. In my career some of the best images came out of such stubbornness, where I just did not want to give up on the image. 

I loved the many hours out on the tundra with the owls. There was so much to see and listen to.

Observations

Owl mother settling her downs around the chicks

I quickly learned about the hunting pattern of the male, that would sit guard some 150 yards from the nest. He occasionally would fly from mount to mount to switch out his perches from where he would hunt the lemmings.
The female would have the responsibility over the nest. She needed to keep the chicks and the last remaining egg warm.

But even she did get anxious once in a while. She had been sitting on this nest for  many weeks, through rain and snow and the daily harassment of the jaegers.
If a long time had passed where the male had not brought in any food, she seemed to try to motive him for the hunt with longing calls. Then when the male finally arrived after a successful hunt, she would change her calls to a kind of ongoing “purring” sound to encourage him to pass over the food. 

Male arrives at the nest with a lemming

It was her job to feed the chicks. I watched the male try once in an helpless effort to stuff a whole lemming into the mouth of a chick. He quickly gave up though, just dropped the little rodent and took off for its perch again.

WHAT IS YOUR PATIENCE REWARD STORY ?

GOT PATIENCE ???

Posted by Florian – June 26, 2009

Waiting Game - I am still stuck in the oil town of Prudhoe waiting for weather!

I often get asked about patience out in the field. In a way it needs to come with the job as a wildlife photographer, right? Am I specifically patient? Well, with certain things yeah, with other things I am not. I want to make them happen right away. Right now I am sitting in the oil-town of Prudhoe Bay. If you checked this blog a few days ago ….. yes I was already waiting then for the fog to clear and the wind to calm down. Guess what ….. the wind is still blowing and now it is not only foggy, but it is raining on top of that. Got patience? Well mine is challenged right now. I am wondering when and IF I will get a break here in the next days. I know the weather in the Brooks Range just 100 miles away is great, but I have the obligation to cover the coast. I need to stand by, to be able to react as soon as the weather changes and I can work with my pilot to cover Alaska`s Arctic Coast.

Well, this gives me time for internet stuff like my blog ……. Let me tell you about another patience story, when I was in a blind waiting for great image of a snowy owl up here in the arctic. I was hooked on the idea of this great image which kept me in a blind for several days - straight. Coming up…..

Over the Arctic Plains

Posted by Florian – June 23, 2009

Our support plane above the migrating Caribou

After flying hours below the layer of fog we see a silver lining at the horizon. We need to put the plane down on a gravel bar and set up camp for the night. My pilot Ken wants to look for a spot where we can get out of the wind. We are fighting a stiff breeze of 20 – 30 nots on the nose of the plane.

As we are flying further inland, the sun finally breaks through the layers of fog. In the far distance I see the brooks range. Dark clouds are hugging the mountains and create a dramatic backdrop for photographs. We follow a river drainage south as I see a group of caribou in the riverbed heading to climb a steep snowbank  to join their group up on the extended plains, where food is plentiful.

We swing around with the plane while I keep an eye on the group running up the step snowbank seemingly without effort. I am trying to caputre the images struggling to keep the horizon straight in the viewfinder while the pilot goes into  a steep bank and balances out the gusts of wind. After hours of flying through bad weather, there it is: A few seconds of action in wonderful golden arctic light.