Grandfather Mountain State Park

Panorama from the top of Grandfather Mountain

Nature Photography Weekend

I took part in a great event at Grandfather Mountain State Park the weekend of June 1st.  The three-day weekend provided talks and hands-on workshops on various topics, all presented by photography professionals.  I won’t detail here all the great information that was provided to us over the three days.  But here is a link to the schedule of activities at the event if you are interested.  Additionally, they provided early access, as well as after closing hours access to the park, which gave us great opportunities to take photographs. 

That’s the quick summary.  But today’s Blog is all about the pictures taken during the weekend.  I’ve arranged picture sets in the following groups: animals in habitat, red squirrels, raptors, and scenery & sunsets.  

Animals In The Parks Habitat Area

The otters are always most entertaining, and dominate the pictures.  The elk were in velvet and shedding their winter fur.  And a Bald Eagle is always worth a pic.  Neither the Bear nor the Cougar came out of hiding for me.

Scavenging For Bird Feeder Scraps

I parked myself on a bench near the Nature Center’s bird feeders and just had fun taking dozens (and dozens) of pictures of the Red Squirrels and Chipmunks.  The Chipmunks darted around and were the most difficult to catch.  Here are a few of my favorite pics.

Raptors

A special session for 30 photographers was arranged for really nice close up photography.  Two Red Tailed Hawks and a Screech Owl were provided by a Blue Ridge rescue organization.  These birds were injured in car hits and could not be returned to the wild. Of note – check out the last two pics of the screech owl.  Most of the pics show it in its normal, sort of fluffed up feathers.  The last one shows him ‘making skinny’ and trying to make himself disappear after he saw the Red Tailed Hawk.  The last hawk pictures are of a ‘Leucistic’ or partial albino Red Tailed Hawk.

Scenery, Vistas, and Sunset

No descriptions….. just the Blue Ridge Mountains from Grandfather Mountain.

I’ll Finish With Another Panorama

The panorama at the top has 9 vertical 70mm pictures stitched together.  This one is a little different.  A wide-angle is not so suited for a panorama, but IT IS something different.  It is 3 vertical 15mm pics stitched together which really shows distortion. 

Be sure to check out a second Blog post from this trip about waterfalls and mushrooms. (<-link)

Thanks For The Look

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