Animals Archives - Page 3 of 6 - Sean Phillips Photography

Bighorn Sheep at Minnewanka Loop

My family and I recently camped in Banff national park at the Two-Jack main campsite. Banff is an amazingly beautiful place and we are very lucky to have it so close to us. We really try to take advantage of that as often as we can, but it never feels like we get there enough. Two-Jack Lake is our preferred campsite, but unfortunately everyone else prefers it too. Two-Jack Main is much larger and we ended up staying there instead. Although it does not have a lakefront view, it has plenty of campsites and it is a very nice place to stay.

Two-Jack Main is in the middle of the Minnewanka loop and it provides easy access to the town of Banff, Johnson Lake, Lake Minnewanka, and of course Two-Jack Lake. The loop is pretty much a sure-fire location to find Bighorn Sheep; I’ve only driven the loop (or hiked at Lake Minnewanka) once without seeing them, and they usually show up in large groups of a dozen or more.

After finishing a short hike around Johnson Lake without seeing any birds or animals (there were far too many people enjoying the lake), we decided to take the longer drive around around the loop on our way back to the campsite. It was an amazing blue-sky day and the wildflowers were in full bloom. We saw several groups of sheep and a few of them even stopped to pose for us!

Richardsons Ground Squirrel at Pearce Estate Park

There are gophers everywhere and I love to watch them. In fact I could spend all day making images of them. I’ve talked about that a few times on this site before, so I won’t bore you with the details; I’ll just share the images and hope that you like them as much as I do!

Bull Moose in Velvet in Algonquin Park

It’s been awhile since my last post, but I have an excellent excuse! My family and I were on vacation in Ontario. The main purpose of the trip was to visit family at a cottage near Eganville, which is west of Ottawa. While we were there my wife and I took advantage of the opportunity to leave the kids with their grandparents and took off for a 3 day, 2 night canoe camping trip into Algonquin Provincial Park. It was our first trek into the interior of the park in several years, so it was very exciting!

Our paddling route took us from the Shall Lake access point (North of Madawaska) through Farm Lake and Kitty Lake into Booth Lake. It was a reasonably short and easy trip with only two portages (90 meters and 550 meters). Of course we had way too much gear (including my tripod and a Pelican case with my camera and other photography equipment) so we had to hike each of the portages twice… We camped for two nights on an island at the south end of Booth, and then took the reverse route back to the access point on the third day. Although the weather was not great (rain and cloud mixed with occasional periods of sun), the park is always beautiful and we really enjoyed the trip.

On the second day we paddled from the south end of Booth Lake down into McCarthy creek. To call it a creek is a bit of a stretch. It’s more of a marshy lake than a creek, but there is a winding channel that goes from one end to the other. The channel is not particularly deep and there were some sections where we were pushing hard through the marsh grasses in the water and our progress was very slow. The scenery was incredible and there were literally millions of Water Lily’s and Lily Pads as far as the eye can see!

We found this young Moose on the marshy shore of the creek. His antlers are just starting to come in for the season and at this point he has only two relatively small nubs covered in velvet. He watched us for several minutes after we found him, before casually wandering back into the woods. He stopped several times along the way to have another snack. It’s always amazing to be so close to such a magnificent animal!

Deer Butt

Sometimes you get the shot you want, and sometimes you get the butt!

I just missed a great chance to make some images of a tiny fawn because I didn’t have my camera ready. This shot of Mom’s butt was all I could get by the time I got my gear working. She stopped to watch me from a distance for awhile, but soon ran off. I saw the fawn trying to follow, but then it simply disappeared in the thick prairie grasses. The doe ran fast, so I really don’t believe that the fawn could possibly keep up, so I suspect that it simply laid down in the field and waited there until the doe felt safe enough to return…

Baby Bunnies in the Flowerbed

I got home tonight and discovered some excitement in my neighborhood about some baby rabbits in the flowerbed at a house across the street. The kids on the street had discovered them earlier in the day and obviously were very excited. Baby bunnies are extremely cute. They are also essentially helpless without their parents around, and so they tried to stay motionless in the flowerbed all evening in order to avoid any attention.

The kids had a good time watching them (and feeding them some carrot sticks), and of course I dropped by to take a few pictures. Other than that they were left alone in the same place that they were found. There had been no sign of the parents all afternoon or evening, but hopefully they will return to collect the babies after it gets dark…