Wildlife

Desert Tortoise in Snow Canyon

Walking along eating grass.

Desert Tortoise in Snow Canyon

This is after about an hour of watching this tortoise. I had walked ahead of it and laid down about 100ft in front of where it was eating and it ended up walking directly toward me, completely comfortable and ignore me by that point.

Desert Tortoise in Snow Canyon

I watched it wander around, and at this point it walked directly in front of me to go to another spot to continue eating.

Desert Tortoise eating flowers in Snow Canyon

At first it was tentative to my presence. I laid still and it came out of its shell and continued eating the flower petals and began walking around.

Desert Tortoise in Snow Canyon

I really like how this shows the front bottom of its shell sticking out under its neck.

Desert Tortoise in Snow Canyon

Early morning hike and saw this tortoise. After the hike I found it again and spent an hour watching it wander around eating.

Long Tailed Weasel

After 2 hours of watching them, right before we were about to leave, we saw this one pull up a gopher to move to a different hole. It was very quick and I only managed to get it from far away, and this ended up being the only one reasonably in focus.

Long Tailed Weasel

One of the three we spent time watching. They are very fun animals to watch!

Long Tailed Weasel

Long Tailed Weasel

They are so fast! Very hard to take photos of while jumping and moving and get it in focus.

Long Tailed Weasel

Long Tailed Weasel

They are very cute animals :-)

Quail at Point Reyes

Bobcat at Point Reyes

Sat and watched it nap for an hour from 22 yards away. But this was the only decent picture I managed to get as it was mostly hidden behind all the grass, and when it eventually got up it darted away quickly. It was pretty cool to see its ears moving around listening while napping.

Western Bluebird at Point Reyes

Peregrine Falcon with Dinner for Babies

While watching the nest of 3 young, both parents came back with food, this being one of the times.

Osprey with Fish

While watching Peregrine Falcons this Osprey showed up also catching dinner at Point Reyes.

Great Horned Owl at Point Reyes

Great Horned Owl at Point Reyes

I would never have seen this if it hadn't been pointed out to me. The two owls were about 20 feet apart blended into the rock.

Blue Heron at Point Reyes

I really liked how it was surrounded by green.

Red-winged Blackbird

Bald Eagle at Almaden Reservoir

Taking off in the rain. Slower shutter speed getting wing blur. (1200mm + APS-C crop + post-processing crop + relatively slow shutter speed + stabilization in post-processing to get this picture)

Bald Eagle at Almaden Reservoir

Sitting in the rain.

Steller's Jay at Pinnacles

Steller's Jay at Pinnacles

I really like the look of the tree in this one as the environment for the Jay, with the lichen and different colors of green.

Calfornia Condors at Pinnacles

These two were hanging out together, after we watched them each land about 20 minutes apart. We learned from the expert there (ranger? naturalist?) tracking them that they were both males, the black headed one 3 years old, and the pink headed one 5 years old.