Chocloate Lilies

Ron Niebrugge Alaska, Lake Clark, Photos, Travel 5 Comments

Chocolate lilies, Lake Clark National Park, Alaska.

Chocolate lilies, Lake Clark National Park, Alaska.

I was amazed at the thick fields of Chocolate Lilies I found during my recent bear photo tour – I have never seen anything close to it!

Now I must admit, the rest of the group did not share my enthusiasm for this wildflower – especially in light of the other bountiful subject matter, namely wonderful brown bears!  So I received a fair amount of well deserved ribbing.  🙂  But I did manage to break away for a couple of minutes to grab a few images of these interesting wildflowers.

Brown Bears Mating

Ron Niebrugge Alaska, Lake Clark, Photos, Travel 6 Comments

Brown bears mating, Lake Clark National Park, Alaska.

Brown bears mating, Lake Clark National Park, Alaska.

We were able to see some unique behaviors during my bear trip a few weeks ago.  I have seen mating behavior in the past in Denali from over a mile away!

These two were interrupted by a much larger, scarred up boar.  There were some intense moments as the two males interacted – we were really thinking we were going to see the creation of new scars as these two battled, I didn’t hold a lot of hope for this pretty boy we nick named Casanova.  But, once things settled down, the big boar finally left and these two resumed their cub making activities.

Bears Close!

Ron Niebrugge Lake Clark, Travel 8 Comments

Brown Bear sow and two cubs, Lake Clark National Park, Alaska.

Brown Bear sow and two cubs, Lake Clark National Park, Alaska.

This was with my Canon 7D with a 2x converter on a 70-200 at 140 – in other words I had trouble getting these guys in the frame with just a 70-20o mm lens !

Brown Bear Boar

Ron Niebrugge Alaska, Lake Clark, Photos, Travel 8 Comments

Brown bear bore (male), Lake Clark National Park, Alaska.

Brown bear boar (male), Lake Clark National Park, Alaska.

Back from an absolutely amazing trip – my photo tour couldn’t have gone better!  Since I go there so often, I didn’t think I would do much shooting – well, 3,600 photos later…  We saw so much amazing stuff including nursing and mating up close!  Back out the door – hope to share more over the next week.