This 'unicorn' elk's deformed antlers make it easy to distinguish him from other elk. I photographed him on Jan 28th, and I think his buddy was also in the same group last month, too. In today's ...
This 'unicorn' elk's deformed antlers make it easy to distinguish him from other elk. I photographed him on Jan 28th, and I think his buddy was also in the same group last month, too. In today's encounter, I spotted them from about 150ft feet away and I took a seat on a log. They slowly but surely grazed my direction and eventually they were both to within about 10ft! It wasn't my intent to get that close, but I literally didn't move one inch after taking a seat. A park ranger saw me and was furious at how close I was! I'm sure it looked really bad from his perspective.. especially if you don't know my background and hadn't seen the slow and gentle walk they made towards me. I need to keep my closest encounters out of sight from the general public so that I don't set a bad example in public view! It was a nice little encounter before the ranger yelled at me and brought a bunch of stress to the otherwise benign situation.
After that, I went on a short hike and came across a very puffed up Stellar's Jay. It was cold and windy, and the bird was conserving energy. I couldn't believe how close it was when I first noticed it. I was looking for the weasel family, and just saw the bird a few feet away. It stayed put for several minutes and then bounced around a bit before eventually flying away after ~30 minutes. Gorgeous detail on the feathers.
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