Bear aware….

Gallatin River Grizzly

Gallatin River Grizzly

Bear with me, (play on words), whileI tell you a little bit about my weekend.   There are many things I love about Montana…the list is very long.   Besides photography, one of the things I really enjoy doing while I’m here is fly-fishing.   My best friend got me into the sport many years ago and I’ve never looked back (thank-you Monte).  Needless to say, we’ve fished some interesting locations.  Throughout the years, I’ve heard countless stories from fellow fly-fisherman about their run-ins with bears (specifically grizzly) but over the past 15 years I have yet to see  a grizzly or black bear near a stream.  I truly was starting to doubt their existence  until yesterday.  We were fishing a stretch of the Gallatin between the Yellowstone  National Park and Big Sky when we decided to take a little lunch break.  It was good timing because a big storm blew in just as we packed things up.  We drove into Big Sky and grabbed a quick sandwich, and as we were heading back to the Yellowstone Park, there was a grizzly only a few hundred yards away from our fishing hole.   Luckily, I had my 70-200 lens and was able to snap a few photos.  I  had left my 1.4x converter at the cabin, so I had to make due.  The following shots were taken at nearly 300 yards.  I had to sharpen the image to add a little detail.  To give you and idea of how far away I was I’ll give you the before and after photo.   The photos are  far from being wall hangers, but sometimes it’s all about making memories.  And yes, grizzlies do exist, and they do like to hang out on fishing streams!

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This entry was posted on Monday, August 3rd, 2009 at 8:47 am. It is filed under General, Wildlife and tagged with fly-fishing, gallatin river, grizzly bear, montana. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.