Last week was the Gunnison Sage-grouse Summit, with really smart people speaking about their projects to save the species from extinction. It was challenging and informative, and I'm a bit more optimistic about the species than before.
I was also able to go out with a CDOW trapping crew and photograph trapping and collaring for relocation to satellite leks that are no longer reproducing, or suffering heavy predation. I've attached a close-up image of a male Gunnison Sage-grouse, a middle of the night portrait.
Posted by Todd Caudle on April 19, 2011 at 5:46 PM
And how do you get a unique view of these birds? You 'neak up on them! HAHAHAHAHA!
That is a killer shot, Dave! The detail is exquisite!
What a magnificent bird, and the detail present here is simply grand!
The colored "eyebrow" is interesting to me. Why is that?
A small adjustment to the white point corrects the slight underexposure.
I'm glad to hear that you're more optimistic about their recovery. What evokes that glimmer of hope?
Posted by Joshua Hardin on April 19, 2011 at 7:02 PM
Beautiful. Great detail indeed! I might be tempted to just darken the background completely to black to get rid of the slightly out of focus shapes in the lower left corner, but it's not a big problem.
I read recently that Grand Teton NP Wyo. will be doing some tours of sage grouse leks over the next couple of weekends. Not sure if you're interested. With access like you got here it would be tough to imagine getting a closer shot!
Thanks for your comments.
The colored eyebrow is called an ocular comb and is present on all of the grouse species. Both Greater and Gunnison have a yellow comb and it's more prominent during mating season. I couldn't find any info. on what it does other than make them look handsome.
I underexposed the RAW file even more, for fear of blowing out the bright white in the neck. I was shooting TTL at -2/3.
I'm optimistic because of the unbelievable coolaborative effort to save the speices. The gov. agencies, private land owners, conservation groups, and communities are all working in concert. It would be hard to describe everything that's going on here - habitat treatments, conservation easements, captive breeding, translocations, and temporary road closures are some of the activities. While I'm optimistic for the near term in the Gunnison Basin, the satellite leks near Norwood and Monticello are in big trouble.
And thanks, Josh for the heads up about GTNP leks. I prefer to shoot from my own blind at close range on leks... Those are Greater Sage-grouse, which are a distinctly different imperiled species. For reference, there are ~ 250,000 greater and ~ 3,500 Gunnison SG. Both are designated "warranted, but precluded" from ESA listing and are candidate species. Most people believe the Gunnison SG will be listed in two years when the evaluation is completed. These birds require large areas of healthy, open sagebrush (without vertical structures) and habitat fragmentation in many forms is causing the steady decline. It's unlikely the Greater SG will get listed anytime soon because of the direct conflict with energy development - even though science tells us they're endangered.
Posted by Jack Brauer on April 20, 2011 at 10:40 AM
Great shot Dave! Hopefully this won't be all that's left of them.
Discussion
9 repliesI was also able to go out with a CDOW trapping crew and photograph trapping and collaring for relocation to satellite leks that are no longer reproducing, or suffering heavy predation. I've attached a close-up image of a male Gunnison Sage-grouse, a middle of the night portrait.
That is a killer shot, Dave! The detail is exquisite!
The colored "eyebrow" is interesting to me. Why is that?
A small adjustment to the white point corrects the slight underexposure.
I'm glad to hear that you're more optimistic about their recovery. What evokes that glimmer of hope?
I read recently that Grand Teton NP Wyo. will be doing some tours of sage grouse leks over the next couple of weekends. Not sure if you're interested. With access like you got here it would be tough to imagine getting a closer shot!
The colored eyebrow is called an ocular comb and is present on all of the grouse species. Both Greater and Gunnison have a yellow comb and it's more prominent during mating season. I couldn't find any info. on what it does other than make them look handsome.
I underexposed the RAW file even more, for fear of blowing out the bright white in the neck. I was shooting TTL at -2/3.
I'm optimistic because of the unbelievable coolaborative effort to save the speices. The gov. agencies, private land owners, conservation groups, and communities are all working in concert. It would be hard to describe everything that's going on here - habitat treatments, conservation easements, captive breeding, translocations, and temporary road closures are some of the activities. While I'm optimistic for the near term in the Gunnison Basin, the satellite leks near Norwood and Monticello are in big trouble.
And thanks, Josh for the heads up about GTNP leks. I prefer to shoot from my own blind at close range on leks... Those are Greater Sage-grouse, which are a distinctly different imperiled species. For reference, there are ~ 250,000 greater and ~ 3,500 Gunnison SG. Both are designated "warranted, but precluded" from ESA listing and are candidate species. Most people believe the Gunnison SG will be listed in two years when the evaluation is completed. These birds require large areas of healthy, open sagebrush (without vertical structures) and habitat fragmentation in many forms is causing the steady decline. It's unlikely the Greater SG will get listed anytime soon because of the direct conflict with energy development - even though science tells us they're endangered.