Colorado Photographer / Author / Wildlife Advocate | Steven W. Krull
Renowned Colorado wildlife photographer and author advocating for our wild living legacy
Today is the day when the sun reaches it's southernmost position in the sky, and begins the journey north in it's march to summer. Of course the sun is not moving around in the sky, but the solstice is "the shortest day of the year, marking the official start of winter, and happens because Earth's tilted axis points farthest away from the sun in one hemisphere."
The conditions looked right for another beautiful sunset over the Sangre de Cristo Mountain range of Colorado, so I loaded up my camera and headed out to the overlook. I arrived with about 20 minutes to wait, and decided it wasn't going to be that spectacular afterall. So I turned the wheel and headed further into the mountains, hoping to find some wildlife in good light.
We just returned from a few days photographing the elk rut in Rocky Mountain National Park. The last few times Kevin and I have visited the park, including an adventure to Yellowstone, we were thinking we were probably too early for the full experience. This time we thought delaying the trip until October might result in cooler weather, smaller crowds, and perhaps a more vigorous rut season.
I have to say, this has been a spendid autumn, as fall colors go in the high country of Colorado. Sometimes we get too much rain and sometimes we get an early winter storm that blows the leaves all the way to Nebraska. But this year we have been blessed with warm calm days, and the colors are fabulous.
Summer isn't giving up yet in Eleven Mile Canyon, or probably anywhere in the Colorado high country. Osprey and great blue heron, and even a bald eagle were enjoying the morning along the rich fishing waters of the South Platte River, and many took the time to stop and pose for our cameras on Friday.
This was a day that I have been eagerly awaiting for months. The osprey have completed their 4,000 mile journey across two continents, to arrive in my favorite Canyon some time this week.
After an absence of over two years, the elk herd is finally returning to my mountain! The last time I saw them, it was autumn and they were feeding early in the morning on the summit of Big Grouse Mountain.
My project for the day was a visit to the Colorado Sangre de Cristo Mountain Range to shoot a panoramic image of the magnificent block fault range with a winter storm and a fog bank rolling in. It took me two days to capture all the images for this post, including the fog bank and deer herd on the second day.
A new year is almost upon us and it seems like a good time to take a look back at 2024, one year in the life of a photographer. Join me in this post as I review a year of pictures in the rugged mountains of Colorado.
It was a perfect day to get out and go snowshoeing in a beautiful Rocky Mountain blizzard. It had snowed several inches the night before but the storm had subsided a bit and the plows had time to clear the streets and the highway to the trailhead.
Colorado Photographer / Author / Wildlife Advocate | Steven W. Krull 