Sow and cubs, Black Bear, Chocolate Bear (20130918) Waterton Park afternoon run.

The rain persisted all day and although we had a productive morning we were hoping for even better luck, but that is our fate, to always be optimisitic:) We were able to find Dopey again, and he was a little closer to the road, so we spend some time watching him. I selected this shot as it really shows off his belly! He is such a great and cooperative subject, very efficient in his eating, very slow and methodical.

As I mentioned earlier the storm had "grounded" many birds, here is a soaking wet Redtail Hawk.

As night started to close in we were thinking it was going to be a bust day when Jamie spotted a Black Sow with a Brown cub, but we didn't get any shots. We rounded a bend at almost quarter to seven and here was Mom with her two cubs, which we had seen the day before. And they were close. He is a shot of one of the cubs standing to check things out.

Here is a shot of Mom, I like the clarity of her eyes in this shot Taken at 30mm with no crop.

Here is the shot of the whole family.

Here is a nice shot of one of the youngsters standing and looking around. I love the little gut that is revealed.

Here is a shot of Mom with her white "V" showing, a very telling mark for identification.

On the last couple of turns before we hit the highway, we found this nice Chocolate bear on a cliff. It was pretty close, and moved even closer as we pulled up.I expect that I was less than 20 feet from this bear as I squeezed of my shots. Here is a shot at 120mm, and no crop. It was quite dark, and I am pleased with this shot.

Just up the highway we found one more Black bear, but I couldn't get any decent shots of it. We grabbed a bite to eat, downloaded pictures and headed off to bed. We shall see what tomorrow brings. Have a great Wildlife week.
Turbo