Congratulations to Andrea & Mike, whose weddding I photographed aboard the S/V Alaska Rover last July in Resurrection Bay, for being featured in the current issue of Alaska Bride & Groom in the Local Weddings section.  I was also pleased to see the magazine refer to me as one of “Alaska’s top photographers” in an article designed to dispell wedding photography myths.

I started my day spending some time with a reporter and camera man from KEVN, or Black Hills FOX, a FOX affiliate in Rapid City.  I took them out near the northeast entrance and talked about photography, what inspires me, my residency, and whatever else came along.  To illustrate my process, I took a shot that I normally would not have, in harsh, mid-day light.  But, with the help of a warming polarizing filter and a break in the clouds, it turned out actually pretty nice, so I include it in this post (top left image in gallery below).  Here is a link to the FOX interview.   

But my time here in the Badlands is winding down.  I only have two full days left, and one morning.  So far, the weather has been quite cooperative.  I guess it is trying to make up for how it has treated me sometimes on this trip.  I had planned to spend some time this evening exploring a tiny section of the park off Highway 44.  It is essentially the bridge between the North Unit and South Unit of the park.  There are no pullouts or overlooks, but I was going to park on the side of the road and hike in to explore.  Unfortunately, they are doing some road construction on Highway 44.  The portion of the road that is now only one way, requiring the pilot car to take you through, is exactly the section I wanted to explore.  So, no joy there.  For Plan B, I continued on through and started from the far end of the Sage Creek Road, working my way back to the Pinnacles Area. 

There were quite a few bull Bison out and about, offering me some great opportunities for close ups as well as broad landscape and wildlife images.  They were all in various stages of trying to lose their winter coat.  It has been almost three weeks since our last snow out here, so I guess they figured they were safe.  It was interesting to be so close to them, as they were grazing I could hear them making this low grunting noise.  Then I heard something I have never heard before.  A large bull had been sitting on top of a rise for quite some time, but he stood up suddenly and stared straight ahead of him … right at another bull.  The second bull had been slowly walking straight at the sitting bull, and the second bull was starting to growl.  Or, at least, that is the closest I can describe the sound.  It was a low, rumbling, very intent growl, and it kept getting louder.  I thought for a second that the two were going to get into it.  I was prepared, at a safe distance with my 500mm and ready to go.  Unfortunately, the second bull stopped growling and backed off.

As I approached the Pinnacles area, I saw two ewe Bighorn sitting on a slope, providing an almost picture-perfect wildlife pose.  They were collared, which most of the Piannacles Bighorns are, but I still photographed them.  Even though they are being monitored, they are still wild.  And wildlife population monitoring is important in guaging the health of the particular population, understanding its habits.  I will try to get up early tomorrow and see if the weather will be right to set up my camera for another time lapse.  I really want to do one more, for a full 24 hours, before I leave.

The Alaska Journal of Commerce, a state-wide weekly newspaper with a business and industry focus, has published an article about my residency here in the Badlands.  Rob Stapleton, the writer of the piece, has informed me that it has been picked up by the Associated Press.  You can read the article, in this week’s issue, online here.

There has been a lot of discussion this past week again about the State of Alaska’s aerial wolf predation control program. It all started with Ashley Judd doing a commercial on behalf of Defenders of Wildlife, lambasting Sarah Palin for maintaining the program, and for her proposing the idea of a $150 bounty if you can produce the leg of a wolf. Fortunately, the law does not allow our Governor to do that.

But, Ron Reagan of Air America Radio, yes, the liberal son of THAT Ronald Reagan, has been giving the issue quite a bit of air time this week. I posted a note on his blog one day, pointing out that the real problem is the Board of Game and its insistence on ignoring the will of Alaskans, as well as the economics of guided hunting in Alaska. But on his show yesterday, one of his guests suggested a blanket boycott of all Alaskan businesses and products. Well, as an Alaskan business that thrives on living wolves and is against the aerial wolf control program, I had to call into his show. (When you play the podcast, skip ahead to the last 4:07 of the program.)

This is not an issue that is going to be solved by boycotts, advertising campaigns, letter-writing campaigns or any of the usual approaches. Unless and until we have leadership in this state that is willing to actually govern by science, not by what we can do to turn a buck, then the issue of irresponsible predatory control is not going to go away.

Oh, and let’s also take into account history. As the saying goes, those who do not remember history are doomed to repeat it. While the grey wolf, or Timber wolf, is not currently listed as endangered in Alaska, it is in the Lower 48, except for Minnesota where it recently has been downgraded to threatened. The reason why wolf populations are so down is due to a historical campaign of hunting them as competing predators, or because wolves have had the audacity to kill livestock in some areas. We appear to be headed in that direction here in Alaska, despite the science and history that warns otherwise. At least then we could have one more thing in common with our neighbors in the Lower 48 - wiping out a species to the brink of extinction. You may not think it can happen here because the population is so large, estimated at 7,700 to 11,200 by the Alaska Division of Fish & Game. (Note how the State, by placing wolves under this Division, considers wolves to be “game”). However, since the reintroduction of the wolf predator control program in 2003 (after the 2000 voter initiative banning the practice expired), the State of Alaska has been responsible for the elimination of 700 wolves. That’s approximately ten percent of the low end of the State’s own estimate of the population. If you are a hunter and you don’t like wolves now, wait until you have the Federal Government stepping in to take over wolf management in Alaska.

I had one of my photos from the Alaska state high school football championships published on ESPN.com. Here is the link.

Going way back to when she was just someone who substituted for vacationing hosts on Air America Radio, I have been a longtime fan of Rachel Maddow. Now, not only does she have her own show on Air America Radio, she has an increasingly popular and influential show on MSNBC. For example, last week she had the second-rated nightly news program for her time slot in the daily Nielson ratings, beating out Larry King Live. And she has only had her own show on MSNBC for a few months. One of the vestiges of her radio show she has maintained on the MSNBC show is her segments where she explores popular culture with Kent Jones; or, more accurately, she learns what she can from Kent about popular culture so she can carry on conversations at cocktail parties about something other than foreign policy, domestic issues, public policy, government, politics …. well, you get the idea. As she says, he tells her just what she needs to know so she can go out in public.

Anyway, if you follow my blog, you would have read about the human Obama logo that Alaska Women for Obama organized a little while ago. Now, the story about that day has made its way to the Rachel Maddow Show on MSNBC as part of her Kent Jones segment. Watch the video.

Late in the morning today, a group of around 350-400 Obama supporters gathered on the Delaney Park Strip with a seemingly impossible mission: to come together to create the visual of the Obama logo and the United States flag.  What started as an idea only a week ago came to fruition, based on what seemed to be about 40% planning, 40% insipiration and 20% winging-it.  The organizers had a good idea of what they wanted to do, and had staked out the outer corners or plot points for both the logo and the flag.  Coordinating from the third floor room of a hotel across the street, a handful of Obama staff and volunteers corralled this group of volunteers into place to form the logo.  More amazingly, they coordinated a mass exodus from the spot, only to return again and run almost perfectly back into place.

Add to the fact that the air was chilly, and it had taken forty minutes to perform the previous maneuver, which was to create a representation of the United States flag.  But everyone present had a belief in the power of what they were doing.  They came together with a common goal to create something that in and of itself did not produce anything tangible.  It did not raise money, it did not gain publicity (no local media was there other than a photographer from the Anchorage Daily News), and it did not change any minds.  But these people were energized, excited and inspired.  They had fun, driven by a sense of hope and wonder, and faith that they were merely a small microcosm of power represented in a movement sweeping this country.  I thought later as I was processing the photos that while there have been several pro-Obama rallies with hundreds, even thousands, of enthusiastic Obama supporters, I have not seen one pro-McCain rally in Alaska.  Sure, there have been a couple lightly attended and access-restricted pro-Palin rallies, but she is not the G.O.P. presidential candidate - though don’t tell her that.  No surprise over the lack of visible support for McCain in Alaska - he did only finish fifth in the Republican primary here in February.

For Doug Burns’ photo diary and narrative on the event, visit his piece on The Daily Kos.  Also, you can read the Anchorage Daily News coverage here.

This image will be appearing in the Winter membership newsletter for The Wilderness Society. It just so happens that the image they selected is also my February 2008 Print of the Month.

I also just completed an interview with the editor of South Dakota magazine to accompany a photo portfolio of winter images from Badlands National Park that will appear in the January/February issue of the magazine. To preview some of the images that will appear in the piece, visit my Badlands National Park gallery on my Printroom site.

John Turbett, a freelance videographer working for the Anthony Robbins Companies, gets up close and personal with one of the black bears at the Alaska Wildlife Conservation Center.  Many photographers often dread working with videographers as the creative visions can sometimes collide.  I found working with John to be quite the opposite: he and I often had the same ideas at about the same time, and worked well in keeping out of eachother’s way.

It has been labeled by national media as the first high school football game of the 2008 season. The match - the visiting Palmer High School Moose against the home team South Anchorage High School Wolverines. I have always been intrigued by the media’s need to label things. The label is so important, whether it is true is immaterial. For example, this game actually started at 7:05 p.m. However, the Soldotna High School Stars hosted the Nikiski High School Bulldogs at 6:00 p.m., over an hour earlier. Perhaps the national media draws a line between what Alaska calls the 4A (largest) schools and smaller schools, like the 3A class that Soldotna and Nikiski belong to. If that is the case, then there should be a qualifier to the label of “First High School Football Game of the Season.” As a photographer who is a member of several professional photography associations, one of the things that is really drilled into me is the importance of truth in captioning. If I am going to publish a composite photo, I should identify it as such. If I take a photo of a game farm wolf, it is unethical for me to identify it as a wild wolf. It seems to me that this labeling issue is merely a small symptom of a broader problem of the media playing fast and loose with ethical rules in order to generate interest in a subject or story.