A Bull Elk Emerges From The Shadows

On a miserable, rainy night along the coast one of my remote cameras photographed a spike bull roosevelt elk (Cervus canadensis roosevelti) walking along a muddy elk trail.



One of the reasons I use remote cameras is because they allow me to take photographs where no sane photographer could possibly pull it off. I had the cameras in place for six days before these photographs were taken. The nights were frigid and dark, and yet the cameras waited patiently.



Water on the lens makes this elk appear as if it is emerging from the ghostly shadows of a nocturnal forest (above).

I pulled the cameras after they were in place for 10 days, primarily because of a massive series of storms moving in from the Pacific. The weather had already been bad, and I had experienced several technical problems, and near destruction caused by water in the past.

My remote camera system has new waterproof connectors, and better weather housing, but I wasn't quite ready to leave it in the flood plain of a small creek.

In one image, the elk passed extremely close to a camera placed very low.



Just inches from the muddy ground, the camera lens received a coating of muck.

Winter Kill

It has been a stormy and cold winter along the coast. I can't be sure if it was the hard time of year, or disease that killed this juvenile, bull elk – but it does not appear that a predator killed it.



Now it is time for the scavengers. When I arrived, it was obvious that they had already started to feast on the carcass. Probably coyotes and raccoons at night, and hawks and eagles by day. In between hail storms, I set-up three, motion-sensing cameras in the muck and mud around the elk to photograph the scavengers.



It will be interesting to see what the cameras record.

Stay tuned.