Tag Archives: bears

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What Wild Bears Do When We Aren’t Watching

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Brown Bears (Ursus arctos) are an enigma. While undoubtedly the most powerful animal in the woods on Chichagof Island and wherever they roam they can also be the most shy. Their shyness is, I believe, linked to their intelligence and their intelligence results in personalities. Their personalities are where Brown Bears truly get truly interesting. It results in multiple survival strategies including where to choose to forage, den, and raise a family. They exhibit kindness, understanding, judgement, and aggression and the amount of those as a daily allotment is linked to the individual. There are “Grumpy Bears”, “Shy Bears”, “Angry Bears”, “Goofy Bears”, and so many more. All of these factors and opportunities for different behaviors are a draw for wildlife photographers like myself. However, regardless of how much we try to fool a bear with camouflage or make them trust us while we are in the field it is undeniable that we are impacting their behavior while we sit behind a camera. That link is so strong that a quick search will guide you to several articles supporting that bears alter their behavior around photographers. So what’s a photographer to do?

This Brown Bear stopped to take a break right in front of my camera trap. I love how the wide angle lens helps you take in the story of this bear and its surroundings!

In 2019, I built my first camera trap to get over the pesky alterations we can have to the behavior of wildlife as we make photos. That journey has snowballed significantly as I have learned more about what works and what doesn’t. In 2019 I set out a few goals for myself including documenting scent poles and “hot feet”. To work towards those goals in 2020 I sought to refine the technique from what I had learned and tackle my visions of the “perfect shot”. My goal isn’t to take pictures of bears, it is to see life through a bears eyes. I doubled my arsenal of camera trap gear by building a second housing as well as building a camera housing capable of being underwater and took to the field.

Scent Trees

If you walk along a bear trail for very long you are likely to find trees where they have rubbed and clawed. Often its apparent the tree has withstood the torture for many years. As bears have a notoriously good nose they rely on scent trees to communicate with other bears in the area. I hoped these hubs of bear behavior would offer lots of traffic and interesting interactions. I certainly learned a few things.

  • A Coastal brown bear gazes up at is rub tree in the Tongass national forest.

After leaving my camera in a few different rub trees, I discovered the trees I chose were not used as heavily as I hoped. I got some very candid shots but no photos of a bear actually rubbing on the tree. Due to that I think I partially failed in my mission because even the remote camera seemed to alter their behavior at the tree. I think the click of the DLSR inside the camera trap was enough to alter the bear’s behavior. This coming year I will be working to rectify that by either insulating the camera box to reduce noise or by investing in mirrorless cameras with silent shutters. That’s what I love about this project – always more to learn in the pursuit of what works best!

Mom and the Kids

Mother bears and their cubs are iconic in wildlife photography and cultures of many origins. They have the reputation of being fiercely protective of their offspring and being “as protective as a mama bear” is a phrase understood by almost anyone. This year I was fortunate to find a spot where a mother and its cub consistently used the same spot in the river. I have dozens of shots of these two, but only a few where each are in frame in a nice composition. I love the insight and context that I could add to their interactions by capturing them with a wide lens.

This mother bear and cub used this spot in the river consistently. It was a great insight into site fidelity.
I love the story of this image – a cub trails closely to its mother. As rivers attract many bears during the salmon run, not staying close could mean an unaccompanied encounter with another bear and that could be fatal.
As cubs get older they start to stray just a bit. I don’t see the mother in this shot, but I bet she isn’t very far away. The gulls in this image tell the story of salmon in the river as much as the bear does.

Impressionistic Shots

Gambling on 50mm

One of the reasons I built two camera traps this year was to expand my ability to take risks and be creative. With only one camera trap my mentality is “put it in a spot where I’m guaranteed a shot”, but a second one allowed me to put one in a spot where I “might get a shot”. In the second camera trap I mounted 50 mm lens which required significantly more planning in the shot prep because you have to anticipate where the bear will come out and how the shot will be composed. Not necessarily an easy thing as both nature and wildlife can be fickle! The 50 mm gamble ended up being a tough shot to get, however, I really like the “over the shoulder” feel you get from these images. Since 50mm mimics our vision it really feels like you are walking right next to the bear.

Up close and personal

There were many instances that my shots focused on some interesting aspect of the bears. Their claws, wet fur, and curiosity were fascinating to look at! These few images below are my favorites of dozens of images that featured only a small part of the bear.

Ambitions and Technology

My most ambitious project this year was to build a split-image housing that is also a camera trap. My goal was to photograph bears in the river holes snorkeling for salmon. I am very, very excited about the potential of the camera – after many trial and errors it worked flawlessly (and without leaking which ended up being a huge hurdle)! However, we had one of the rainiest summers in a many years this year and the high flows reduced the amount of time I could have the camera out – I was concerned about it washing away and I needed clear water in order to pull the shot that I had in mind off. These images are my best efforts this year, but I can’t wait to get back at in next year!

So now both you and I have a little bit better idea of what bears do when we aren’t looking. I can’t wait to continue to develop my camera trap technique, continue to document behavior, and bring you more stories of bears in nature. In the meantime, please remember to take ethical wildlife photography seriously. The animals is more important than your shot! If you want to delve more into the world of ethical wildlife photography please start by reading this article by my photography colleague David Shaw.

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The Week the Rains and Salmon Came to Hoonah

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When something you expect and love (although sometimes you may not know you love it) is absent for a long time you experience great joy in its return. When the rains returned to Hoonah after the second  driest July in 20 years I rejoiced in how quickly it rejuvenated the ecosystem and in the resilience and patience of salmon.

A July Without Rain

In July 2018, there was something very obviously missing from Hoonah, Alaska : rain.  Even though this was only my third summer in Hoonah, it was not difficult for me to think back to previous summers and acknowledge how the lack of rain was impacting our local berry patches,  rivers, salmon, and forests. The conditions reduced the wet muskegs to patches of brittle sphagnum moss and sedges. There was a noticeable impact on our salmon berries and blueberries. Very few salmon berries ripened, and blueberry barrens normally laden with ripening berries had nearly blank bushes. Our local temperature rainforest ecosystem was struggling without rain.

Bear, Coastal Brown Bear, Hoonah, Alaska, Game Creek
Coastal Brown Bears feed on Chum Salmon that made it into the river despite the low flows. The salmon were easily captured because they lacked the ability to escape.

The lack of rain resulted in a lack of spawning salmon. It is expected in July that Pink and Chum Salmon would fill the holes throughout the rivers. However, the drought-like conditions reduced rivers to minimum baseflows and kept Chum and Pink Salmon from easily returning to rivers.  Especially Pink Salmon were almost absent from all of Hoonah’s major rivers because they were trapped in the mouths. Without a large rain event they would remain at the mouths until desperation and time forced them upstream.

Bear, Coastal Brown Bear, Hoonah, Alaska, Game Creek
A Coastal Brown Bear snatches a Chum Salmon from Game Creek outside of Hoonah Alaska. Only half of the river had active flow in it and the breeding Chum Salmon were subject to high predation from waiting Bears.

Chum Salmon, Dog Salmon, Hoonah, Alaska, Spasski River, Underwater
During July Chum Salmon were able to get into the rivers because they are larger than Pink Salmon and can skirt up the riffles more easily.

Climate Norms

It is easy for time to erase the memory, and for past perceptions about the weather to vary widely. However, I talked  to many in Hoonah who could never remember the rivers so low. I was curious to know if that was true or if time had changed the memory.  Although Hoonah does not have a river baseflow station I used precipitation data and assumed that low monthly precipitation results in low rivers.  The summarized data showed that we received 1.11 inches in July 2018 and that only 2009 was lower with 0.9 inches. 1999 was noteably low with 1.51. inches. As Hoonah is centered in a temperature rainforest each of those years was far different than the average of 3.95 inches of rain that Hoonah would expect in July. These results made July 2018 the 2nd driest in 20 years!

Rain, Analysis, Hoonah, Climate, Weather, Precipitation
Total rainfall accumlation at the Hoonah airport from 1998 to 2018. In the last 20 years there have been two instances where July has been very dry – 1999 and 2009. I would infer in those years that rivers were similarly low as our 2018 July. Data are summarized from the NCDC NOAA Daily Summaries dataset (https://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/cdo-web/datasets#GHCND)

I was struck when summarizing the data in the amount of variation of precipitation over the last 20 years in Hoonah. Even 2018 was an example of that.  It was in stark contrast to July 2017 which was noted as the “10th wettest” by Juneau weatherman Rick Fritsch.  I needed to keep this summer in perspective : although it was obvious that our rivers, berries, and salmon were stressing from the heat and lack of precipitation, each had been through this before.

The Relief of Rain

In early August the drought came to an end. It rained and poured for nearly a week as an “atmospheric river” brought in moist air from the Gulf of Alaska. I can say with confidence I have never been so relieved to get rain. Overnight the muskeg ponds were filled and returned to the wetlands they were meant to be. The rivers were choked with water and soon after brimming with salmon. Despite the drought and the longer wait at sea they had returned anyway. I could only smile as I watched them in the rivers circling in the holes and splashing up the riffles.

Salmon, Alaska, Hoonah, Pink Salmon, Split Level, Underwater, Go Pro
Pink salmon followed the rain in and filled the upper holes of local rivers.

With global climate change already heavily impacting Alaska the drought felt like a warning knell for times to come.  Scientific modeling for the region suggests we will continue to warm drastically but that precipitation amounts will remain about the same.  The outlook for salmon in a warming climate has different endings depending on who you will talk to. Certainly there is a lot of variability between glacial systems, snow systems, mountains, rain regimes, and so much else which makes a certain future hard to predict. Global warming will impact each salmon species differently (some potentially positively and some negatively) and there is no scientific concurrence how exactly what the impact of a warming world will be for salmon. My views are generally pessimistic for our salmon in the next 50 years, but their patience and resilience this year give me hope they will find a way to survive in the future, too.

Cascade, Hoonah, Alaska, River, Long Exposure, Waterfall, Lighting
A local stream choked with high-flows from the drought-ending rain.

Future climate models show temperature to increase in Hoonah Alaska over the next 50 years. Data from SNAP community profiles.

Future SNAP precipitation models suggest that rainfall will remain pretty consistent, however, with warming temperatures more winter precipitation will fall as rain instead of snow. That will reduce crucial mountain snowpack that feed salmon streams.

Salmon, Alaska, Pink Salmon, Underwater Salmon, Alaska, Rain,

Alaska, Birds, Landscape Photography, Mammals, Micro 4/3 Photography, Nature, Northern Lights, Photography, Science, Wildllife

2016 Alaskan Calendar is Now for Sale!

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Hello Everyone,

I am very, very, very  excited to write inform you of the release of my 2016 calendar! The content features some of the best imagery on this website, plus a few things that have never seen the “light of day”. The calendar is entitled “Seasonal Moods of Alaska” with imagery for each month captured in that month. The calendar is 100% designed by me including feature images, transparent images, windows, and text tying the imagery to the season. A huge thanks to my family and fiance for helping to proof the calendar! I believe the final product is a work of art mingled with science.

If you want to see it, clicking on the cover image or link link will bring you to the sales site that I created.  Otherwise, keep reading for some more information 🙂

2016 Seasons and Moods of Alaska Cover

https://ianajohnson.com/customproducts/

The calendar is printed on 9.5×13 paper and spiral bound leaving ample of room to write in your schedule. Of course it has a hole for hanging if that is all you want to do with it! With imagery from throughout Alaska, the calendar is a great memento of your trip to Alaska, for a friend who has been here, or to bring inspiration for your future trip here!

This calendar is being printed by my local shop in Perham, Minnesota. Your consideration and support also helping the local economy in Perham.

2016 Calendar Final 9halfx138
Each month has a premier image. This image from Mendenhall glacier showcases the high resolution imagery within the calendar.

2016 Calendar Final 9halfx1323
Every month has a transparent image behind the grid, and small windows with images from that month. Writing in the lower right panel ties together fuses the imagery and writing together.

The calendar will be available for pre-order through October 15th. At that time I will begin shipping orders. You can help me out a huge amount by spreading the word about this calendar or through a purchase! Thanks you so much in advance for your support in this project!