Barry Willis

Sorry Guy's, my grand daughter has been on here playing around and posting stuff and I can't figure out how to delete it.

I do remember you mentioning this before Smitty, and I appreciated it then and I appreciate it now. All my pics are from a sd card best money can buy. I done a few tests and I can put any other pics on the forum. I can email them to my friends, myself but I can't get them on the forum so??? I checked out imgur and they want money that I don't have and being so computer illiterate I wouldn't know how to do it. So I don't know, I'm buffalowed.

Hi everyone, this is what my grampa looks like when he goes to the bush. I call him the little sasquatch. I was scare to go at first but he always said stay close to me and you will be safe. and I was. He might want to

I was able to recover some of my pics, not all them but some. They suck though as my computer again wouldn't let me post them on the forum so I had to pull them up on the monitor and take a pic of them, import them into a file then move them to another file in order to post them. So they are grainy. not very clear and the color is washed out, so yeah they suck but here are a few anyway. The first one is a wild horse, coyote of course, then my favorite little buddy came to pay a visit - the very elusive Pine Marten. Unfortunately I only have a head shot of the lynx in the daylight, and I certainly didn't expect to see a skunk way back here sixty miles from any human dwelling or settlement. Anyway I've been at this all day and my little buddy has had to listen to me cussing throughout it all so it's now nap time LOL.

You're welcome Lew, always a pleasure.

Good morning Lew. Haha, It's funny you ask, when I was just a wee lad thanks to my dear old Dad I took such an interest in all aspects of nature (still do) and especially tracks for a couple years and published a few videos and a book that I simply called wild animal tracks of Canada. That is without a doubt a wolf track from a pretty much full grown wolf. you're right it is too big for a coyote, a coyote track is seldom if ever longer than 3in. A dog track is more roundish as a wolf track is long with the four distinct toes. Normal length for a wolf track is 5in. long and 3-4in. wide. I've only ever seen one bigger. The longest wolf track ever documented (I don't remember when) was in the NWT 7.5 in. long. I would have loved to have seen the wolf that left that track. I'm glad you shared it thank you.

I'm sorry I never answered you question The camera is located about an hours drive north west of the house here in Calgary. LOL. That's one bonus living here we can be right in the mountains within an hours drive from the house. It's something we never tire of.

Found a small wolf track and a good size cougar track near my camera this morning. But not near enough to get them on film. Hope fully next time. I should have placed something on the ground next to them to give them some scale as in size. To late smart as usual.

If I can hit it right and sneak into this place before being told to leave as they police it very well because of the danger. When they open the dam on this particular reservoir which the dam is quite long, the water cascades into a giant water fall plummeting about 100yards straight down the water then goes through a narrow limestone chute going down hill yet, it is deafening like thunder or worse and the scariest thing I have seen in my life. I have never seen water move so fast. it isn't just turbulent, It is literally extremely violent' I cannot give you the extreme nature of it .It doesn't matter what size log, 45gallon drum or anything else you throw in it this thing (if you can get close enough) it is instantly gone. you just don't see it again. I have a very large and very powerful drone maybe they will let me use it from the top of the dam, I'd get better videos. I just have to get their schedule if they'll give it to me. The first time I seen it when I was fishing they never seen me but I wasn't expecting it so had no video camera. I've been kicked out every time since. Trouble is I have to leave my boat up above on the lake climb up and sneak across the dam without being seen and down the other side. so if they don't see me around my boat they have a pretty good idea where I am, LOL there aren't many places to hide so they always catch me. At least they are nice about it and give me a ride down the dam to my boat. I'm gonna keep trying as this is something to see and hear it really is. If I get it you guys will not believe it. So keep your fingers crossed for me. It is likely going to take some time but well worth the time. If worse comes to worse I'll get a buddy to drop me off with the boat and come back and get me later that way they won't know I'm there. I don't expect they will put up with me much longer without charging me for trespassing a visit to the crow bar Hotel.

I almost had to go to this extreme 50 years ago.

I enjoyed reading that Lew. I'm happy it turned out to be a pleasant memory. You did the right thing by backing away slowly. Those that try to run when it's too late or try and fight back are the ones that tend to suffer the more serious injuries. Running away from a bear excites the predatory instinct in the them and the chase will be on and the outcome will be up to the bear. Another thing, never look a bear in the eye's as they take it as a threat. I am glad you found my story interesting. Sometime in early June I should have some new and exciting grizzly pics. My wife says I shouldn't but I am. I'm up hours before her so I'll be in bear country before she has one eye open. There are certain bears that we have gotten to know over the years that are easy to photograph as by the same token they have gotten to know us. So long for now.

Yes it is so, upon closer inspection it doesn't have the body of a pine marten. I'll pay closer attention from here on.

I definitely understand that most people don't want them in close vicinity and one does need to give them their space. When I was a wee lad Lew, my dad was a very recognized gun smith. I remember sitting at the kitchen table looking at his books and magazines and that one thing I wanted to shoot more than any thing was a grizzly, these big vicious bears that killed people. As I got older I became a studier of the bear, an admirer of the bear, a Lover of the bear. Maybe you've seen Doug Sues and Bart the bear and better yet (youtube) Jim and Jimbo. Grizzlies show more love and affection than a dog. They are extremely gentle and their intelligence ranks right up there with the great apes. All the years I have spent and my wife sometimes In the Alberta Rockies armed with little more than a camera, no guns, bear spray wasn't invented studying them we have never been threatened or have felt threatened. Of course we try to view them from a distance, but sometimes that didn't always work. At times we have had one sneak up on us, not to attack us but to try and determine who we are, what we are and what we are doing there. Once they perceive the is no danger they carry on with their day. I will admit it can be very unnerving at times when you have an animal that big and powerful almost breathing down you neck. I'm not saying bear attacks don't happen, we all no they do. Most times it is brought on by a human with food (they can smell food 3 miles away) or by surprising them, watching and guarding a kill, or you might just come across one that is peeved off at the world and will show placed or displaced aggression in other words taking it out on who or what ever they see or in displaced aggression, bears quite often get very irate when things don't go their way (sounds like me) by taking it out on themselves mostly by biting their feet, clawing their face etc. Then there is always the old ones that haven't found enough food as they are too week and feeble to do so or there teeth are so wore down and missing that they cant chew it to den up and last the winter. People sometimes become prey to these old bears that are looking for an easy meal. Holy man I can't believe I've carried on this long. I guess it just goes to show how passionate I am about grizzlies. I am sure there are those that disagree with me but these are my an my wife's findings over the years. And yes we are still in one piece and would do it over again if we could. I expect you or anyone else reading this has fell asleep by now Lew. I better get off her before I am asked to. Again, sorry for such a long letter.

That's some pretty wild looking water there Lew. 40 yeasr's ago I would have attempted in my Sportspal but today I doubt even my boys would.

I'll tell ya what Lew. That's just beautiful. I wish I had them visiting my lawn. Especially grizzlies.

Looks like ya had a pine marten pay s visit. I love them little guys. Nice black bear if I'm not mistaken looks like he just needs to grow a little more. Nice pics man.

Thanks Lew. I'm very dissapointed I didn't get to post the really nice ones and trying different things I lost them all even in my back up file. I've been doing this for many years. Some of my best shots ever were on that card from the past couple months. Next time I'm taking three cameras, trouble is there's over three feet of snow and I don't have tracks for my Argo in order to get back in to where I want to hang them. So now I am waiting for snow and ice to melt. A lot of times I go between 40 and 50 km back in. It's a nice trip.

Well after all my buggering about I lost all my other trail cam pics from last month but this one. The rest were much nicer during daylight hours. I'll have more at the end of May.

Thank you Akrisoner, I like how you put that. When I took this photo my wife and I were actually out looking to photograph and record grizzlies in Kananaskis Country Alberta. My wife actually spotted him first and got an awesome video while he came down off a hill which was more like a cliff right towards us. His silver tip guard hairs just rippled across his body with every step he took. It was truly a sight to behold. With the wind in our favor he didn't know we were there until he heard me taking pics of him with my 35mm Minolta. We're so close that on the video you can actually hear him ripping the grass and chewing it. Once he saw us he was gone like a shot. I ran after him hoping for another shot as my wife was screaming at me, don't you be chasing that bear. (hence my nick name Bearcat, LOL) I should have known better as they can out run a quarter horse for the first 100 yards. But I'm glad I did as I crested a hill I seen him stopped in a meadow a couple hundred yards out and was peaking around a tree at me thinking he was hid not realizing the rest of his body was exposed out the other side of the tree. It was funny but I can't find the photo. I have several more close ups of grizzlies but it will take a while to find them as my photos aren't very well organized on our computer and there's tens of thousand of them to go through. Sorry for such a long story. Thank you.

Well I was able to post this one so I think I now know what to do with the others. Delete them and start over. Good thing they are still on my camera memory card.

Here goes nothing. Well that's it. If I try one more time I am going to throw this computer out the window. If it would fit I would have flushed it down the toilet long before now but had I done that I would have been following right behind it out of my wife's grasp, LOL. In my personal opinion I feel the pics I am trying to post are worth a gander at. I'll try and find someone more computer literate than myself to help figure out what is wrong with it. I hazard to guess the price of a new one. Thanks very much for all the help you fellas offered. I NEED A DRINK, CHEERS.

Thanks Limeyangler. I have lots more but I can't post them. I will give it another try. I see lots of bobcats but lynx are much more elusive.

Nope.

I have a picture on the trail cam of a bush rabbit and a very lucky rabbit at that, it was checking out the bait just seconds before the lynx showed up.