A Couple More New Photographs...

I started the week with some new photographs so I thought I would finish the week with a few new shots. The whitetail deer was taken on Saturday January 17 when Linda took me to the area she observed the herd in. I feel pretty good about this place and hope to scout it out enough to be able to get photos in the spring with the young as well as the bucks in velvet this year. I shot the duck this past Sunday shortly after photographing the two deer laying down. Someone else help me out here on the type of duck it is, there was an American Black duck close by and Mallard, but this birds head just didn't fit in.

Warmer And More Colorful Times...

It is that time of the week again, Sky Watch Friday. Please take the time to click the link to the left to enjoy sky watch photographs from all over the world, the staff of sky watch are to be commended for the fantastic job they do each and every week.

First off please don't forget to click on the photograph it will get much larger. This was taken the beginning of November last year when my son and I took a road trip looking for things to shoot. This pretty spot was found along the Cumberland Highway between Pleasant Hall and Roxbury in Franklin County Pennsylvania. With the cold weather and grey skies I really miss the blue and white when I look up. Come on summer time.

What Are You Looking At...

Don't worry folks I still have a few newer photographs from the east that I will post, this photograph just happened to be ready and scheduled for Monday until I got out and released the shutter a few times this past weekend. This bull was captured in Yellowstone during the rut of 2006, maybe I should dig into my 2008 rut photos for something new soon from the west.

Our Front Yard Friends...

As with yesterdays whitetail photograph today's photos were taken just last week also. We feed the birds and have for many years. At out present house we have five feeder's out right now not including all the seed we put on the ground for the doves and other birds. This particular spot is in our front yard right up against our porch. Next to these birds is about a 20 foot hemlock tree, they love this tree as it gives them the security and safety they need to survive. With the hawks in our area I try to provide the birds a safe place to eat and not set them up as a hawk feeder.

My wildlife friends can set me straight if I miss identify the birds. The first one is a White-crowned Sparrow, a winter visitor to our parts. He is much like the White-Throated Sparrow but lacks the yellow above and in front of the eye. I believe the second bird to be a Dark-eyed Junco. These photos were actually shot from the warm comfort of my front room with the lens up against the window. In the last two week I have also watch a male and female cardinal, doves and many other different sparrows enjoy the meal along with a wood pecker (I don't know witch kind) eating at our back yard feeders.

Trying To Make Things Happen...

For the last few weeks I have been posting photographs taken over the last three plus years, the problem is none were just taken. There is three blogs I follow every day, Pennsylvania Wildlife Photographer (Willard Hill), Country Captures (Salty Hill) and Ken Conger Photography all are wildlife blogs and more often than not they are newly recorded photographs. Now I am sure they all have had problems coming up with photos or something to say from time to time, but for the most part they are new images.

These guys don't get these images with luck, granted it is always nice to have a little luck. They get the photos by first being out in the wild and more importantly doing there homework and learning the animals and their habits. I understand the local wildlife but have never taken the time to learn the area I live in well enough to go out and get the shots. I said at the beginning of the year I was going to get out and stop procrastinating, well I have done just that being out each of the last two days.

My wife Linda was a big help giving me a jump start Saturday morning. On Friday I got a call from her at work about a herd of deer she had seen that afternoon. As she relayed it there may have been as many as 15-16 deer in this herd. Shortly after getting home from work Saturday morning we head out to the area she was telling me about and there they were close to the same area numbering at that time 7-10 whitetail. This did not include the four others we seen close by. I shoot a few photographs even though they are not in the best of settings but more importantly I head right back out the next morning. Sunday morning I only seen these two, a little further off but laying in the snow waiting to be photographed.

I also got out to one of the local waterways to shoot some birds and have been shooting my own birds that seem to be eating us out of house and home. I must be the only one feeding them as often as I have to fill the feeders. Needless to say it gives me a few days of new photographs to post and maybe the start of getting out and making things happen like those guys do.

Teton Bull Moose...

Hey it is moose Friday, not really I just didn't know what to say so I called it that. But it is Friday and that is a great thing. This bull was captured along with a few cows during the rut in the Tetons in 2006. Lets see if I can spell this correct, they were found on the Gross Ventre Highway in the camp grounds. If you have never been to the Tetons and you go this is one of the better places to find moose. That's all for know see you on Monday.

Teton Sunset...

Hello and welcome to another week of Sky Watch Friday, this is two weeks in a row for me so maybe I am getting back into the swing of things. This sunset photo was taken in the Grand Tetons in the fall of 2006. Every time I have been there I have had little to no luck with morning and evening colors. The cloud gods just never want to cooperate with me. Be sure and click the link for sky watch to view great photos from all over the world.

Rosie Crosses The Road...

Since I am posting wildlife in a different setting today I wanted to give you all a little history on me and photographing wildlife. I do not photograph caged animals, I do not like caged animals, I only photograph animals in the wild in their natural surroundings. Normally I try and take photographs without roads, street signs or anything else that is not natural. Sometimes I do not have a choice or choose to take the photo for a different reason.

This is Rosie, she is a well known Yellowstone black bear. I took this photograph in the fall of 2006 on Dunraven Pass. That particular year this was a hot spot for bear viewing, it was not this year. I took this photo because I wanted a shot of Rosie and because this is a part of Yellowstone. Animals crossing the road and traffic jams are a regular occurrence in the park. She was wasting no time getting down the mountain this day but I still manages to get seven or eight shots of her before she was gone. There was grizzly bears in the area and rumor has it she was being chased by one. If you look close you can see the tourist taking a photograph through the windshield of the SUV.

Small Bulls Want Photographed Also...

Many times I have noticed that people only want to photograph the large bulls or the whitetail bucks with large racks. Just last week Willard the Pennsylvania Wildlife Photographer posted a photograph of a young spike buck, even with his broken antler I enjoyed looking at that deer as much as I do a large buck. This first year bull, yes he is a bull look closely and you will see the buttons in front of his ears, was with larger bulls and cows but he went off on his own and gave me what I felt was a nice back drop to photograph him. I also do not hesitate to photograph the cows and does, they to make good photographs. By the way this was a very cold morning much like we are about to have here in Pa.

Yep More Elk Photos...

I am glad many of the people that look at my site like Elk photographs because I have plenty more and I plan to get many more this year. This big guy was photographed in Yellowstone during the rut in 2006. He had a large herd of cows but no competition during the times we viewed him. There was one other bull hanging close by but he was a one or two year old and knew he could not compete so he kept his distance and didn't have much to say.

Jumping Into The Weekend...

This morning starts my weekend and like this Coyote jumping onto his dinner I am jumping for joy. It is a weekend with not allot planned, the Hershey Bears are home Friday and Saturday night, I will listen to them on Sunday when they face the baby Pens and I hope to watch some football. Of course I need to do some type of work to keep the boss lady happy, that will be determined later. Have a good weekend everyone.

It's Sky Watch Friday Time...

Send up the fireworks it time for Sky Watch Friday. It has been over a month since I last participated in Sky Watch Friday, between work and the holidays I just didn't have time to look at other sites like I wanted to so I made other post on those days. Don't forget to click on the sky watch link to the left to enjoy many great sky watch sites from around the world, the staff does a great job bringing us all together. I hope everyone had a safe and wonderful holiday.

Resting Elk...

This big six by six was taking a break until I disturbed him from his nap. I didn't pester him any more, a few quick shots and I was on my way to leave him alone. I hope you all like Yellowstone, until I get out to shoot more photos you will be seeing many more from there.

Yellowstone Bison...

I am still having that writers blank, so I will just leave you with this photograph of Bison grazing in Yellowstone. Keep your fingers crossed that we don't have the bad weather today making my commute home from work longer.

Monday Morning Blues...

I don't know about anyone else but my family is experiencing the Monday morning blues, Shane went back to school and Linda went back to work today after being off since before Christmas. For a change it is even a Monday for me starting my four day tour today.

Since it has been some time since I have gone out and shot anything new you will just have to keep seeing many more shots from Yellowstone past. This was taken during our family vacation in July 2005. This was right after I started shooting digital and after looking through the files for some photographs to post I must say I have gotten 100% better at photography. Now I don't really know what that means, it might be saying allot or very little about my capabilities.

New Things For A New Year...

With every new year brings new things in a persons life, for me I don't really know what new things the coming year has in store for me. I do not make new years resolutions because I have never kept them in the past, so why try and fool myself now. I know I will be getting a new fire chief at work after working for the same chief my whole career, new apparatus will be placed into service this year and I may even leave the truck for a different job. Outside of work we hope to vacation in Hawaii this year and my son will become a teenager. I would like to work out more and change my eating habits and I would really like to quit saying I want to get out and shoot more and just do it. I hope to meet fellow wildlife bloggers and cyber mentors Ken, Willard and Salty this year. Whatever happens new this year I am sure it will fly past in a blur.

I would like to thank everyone that stopped by my site this year and a bigger thanks to those of you that took the time to comment. I am hoping for more constructive criticism this year, it is the only thing I have to tell me if I am doing the right things with the camera and Photoshop. With that said I would like to share my site statistics for 2008.
14,909 visits
33,071 pages viewed
Average pages viewed per visit 2.22
Average time on the site per visit 2:32
August was the most viewed month of the year
67% of visits were referrals (most from my Shippensburg Fire site)
20% were direct visits
13% searched onto the site (most by typing Bradley Myers)
I had visitors from 74 countries and every state in the U.S.

Again a big thanks for stopping by, Brad

Happy New Year...

I had nothing ready for today so I sat in front of the computer the last day of the year to go through files and find a photo to post. One of the files I opened had photographs I had taken of my nephew Logan Robinson for his senior pictures. Some of them had been re sized for sending my sister for her approval. This particular photographed I used a number of blending options and layers mask on to get the end result. Now you can tell me what you think of it good or BAD. I can not get any better or learn that I stink at this and should quit without positive or negative feedback. With the new year I plan to make some changes in my photography, less procrastinating and more getting out and shooting. I also plan on trying more on photoshop and getting some classes in.

Logan will graduate this year from the Shippensburg Area Senior High School, he was recently inducted into the National Honor Society and plans to attend a trade school in Williamsport to be a gun smith.

Cats Love Christmas Also...

Sorry today's post was a little late, I got on this morning at work to find no photographs, I was sure I had something ready and uploaded last night. After getting home this morning I found out I did have the post ready but never uploaded it for a scheduled time.

These are our three cats Kyle, Cappy and Alex in order of the photos. They have all been on the site before but never at the same time. They love Christmas also mostly jumping into the open boxes or hiding under the wrapping paper. They also love to sleep under the trees, but they never get into trouble or break anything. I guess we got lucky there. They are all family members but they each gravitate to a certain person, Cappy is all Linda's kitty, Kyle is Shane's and Alex is my little girl.

This being the last post for the year I hope everyone had a Merry Christmas and a safe and Happy New Year. See you all next year.

New Harrisburg Tower 1...

Harrisburg received their new tower truck right before Thanksgiving, it is scheduled to go in service tomorrow morning so I thought I would introduce to the kids and adults that are still children at heart and like fire trucks, plus I didn't know what else to post.

The rig is a 2008 Pierce Arrow XT with a 75 foot aerialscope boom remounted from our old 1989 CF Mack tower. I was spending the morning out doing driver training when I realized that a great place to photograph it would be in front of the old Reily Station 10 now used as our fire museum. The weather was gloomy but it is not my rig so I may not get another chance to photograph it in this spot. The city is also getting a new engine with the same cab that will run out of my firehouse, you can expect to see it soon.

The Vigilant Hose Company, Shippensburg, Pa...

The Vigilant Hose Company has been decorating their fire station for many decades. The past few years I have not had the opportunity to get to Shippensburg to photograph the building for one reason or another. This Christmas Eve I finally had the chance. The conditions were not the best as it was raining all evening, but when it turned to a drizzle I set up the tripod to get some photos. My luck ran out three photos into the shoot, one of their young guys pulled up and parked on the street along the yellow line right in front of the building, I waited but he never returned to his car so this is the best I got. Maybe I will try again next year.

Stupid Is As Stupid Does...

It is amazing the stupid things you see people do at National Parks. I guess they forget the first part of wild animal is WILD. These are some of the most unpredictable and dangerous animals you can run into and they just walk right up to him and spoiled photo opportunities for those of us that respect the wildlife and play by the rules. This incident was even worse than the photo shows, but I will not go into that right now. I am sure there are plenty of you out there that look at this site that have run into similar events.

Merry Christmas Everyone...

Good morning everyone and Merry Christmas. I thought I would change things up a bit today and post someone else's photograph. I can only assume that my mother took this picture with a Kodak camera. This is from a Christmas past, 1965 that is. I know by looking at my profile photo you all thought I was maybe mid twenties at the most, I get that all the time, I look very young for my age. Remember it is Christmas so be nice.

During this Christmas we lived in an apartment on Burd Street in Shippensburg. The girl behind me is my sister Elizabeth, I could not tell you what she got that year but you can see Santa was very good to me. By the way I still have the pedal fire truck, it is in my office in excellent condition. Funny thing is 43 years later and I am still playing on fire trucks, they are just a little larger now.

Waiting For Santa...

This Could Be A Coors Add...

Maybe This Year I Can Pull The Sleigh...

This is not the same Elk as Friday's post and it was shot in a different area of Yellowstone. Had I paid attention to the weather I would have switched these two post around as cold as it is this morning, Brrrrrrrrrr!

A Cold Morning...

A Beautifil Place To Visit...

It Must Have Been A Wonderful Time...

Teton Moose...

Velvet Elk...

More Yellowstone...

Old Faithful Ground Squirrel…

Cody, Wyoming...

Yellowstone...

Camp Charlie...

Does anyone else out their that does a daily photo blog ever get tired of doing it? Well I am, sometimes I tire of looking for a photo to work up because I have not shot anything new for awhile, I tire of working on the photo and I just become blank with what to say. Maybe it is the time of the year, maybe it is just one of the times I get down on my work, I really don't know but lately it has been getting harder and harder to do this.

I don't have a huge audience but I do have a decent following so I would really hate to take a break now and loose what I have worked the last year to get. With that said I will post a photo everyday this week but I plan on doing so without much if any text.

Camp Charlie is located on the Lower Horse Valley Road in Franklin County Pennsylvania. It was built in 1965 by my father and grandfather. After my grandfathers passing my uncle purchased his half of the cabin. This was once a thriving hunting camp, now it is more a get away and relaxation place than a hunting camp. I posted this today since we are starting the second week a deer season here in Pa. and also because it is the only thing I had ready and handy at the moment. With any luck I will get the opportunity to keep this cabin in the family for many more decades to come between my son and I. Of course it would not be for hunting, but for fishing and photography.

A Little Late For Picking Corn...

Another one of those days when I can think of nothing to say. This photograph was taken this past Sunday at a farm behind my house. I was coming home from work on this dreary morning when I spotted these sitting close to the road they just looked like they were screaming for me to photograph them. Pressed for time since I was picking up my son and heading to a toy and train show I grabbed him and my camera and headed off. A couple of quick shots from the truck window and away we went. Every year I say I am going to go out and photograph the fall colors and the farmers out working but in never seems to happen. Maybe one of these years I will follow through with it.

More Hershey Bears...

I really didn't want to do three days in a row of the Hershey Bears but I had these ready so, I am anyways. The Bears and Caps just keep winning. Last week the Bears sent four players up to the Caps because of injuries but they are still winning. This is a scheduled post but at the time that I am typing it the Bears have more wins, more points and 26 more goals than the next closest AHL team. All this with seven kids just 20 years old, I might have underwear that old. The Caps also keep winning with the Bears filling in their lines this just may be my year. A Stanley and Calder Cup, that would be great.

The top photo was taken a few days before these guys got called up to the Caps. The #21 Graham Mink and #17 Chris Bourque were both called up last week, #26 Quintin Laing spent the last third of last season playing for the Caps and helping them reach the playoff by blocking shot after shot. The second photo is a close of of Mink. The video was taken October 26 at the Giant center it last 27 seconds and shows Laing scoring a goal after the face off.

No hockey on Friday, I am hoping to post something recently photographed.

Hockey Family...

As I said yesterday we are a hockey family, so I thought I would put up some of my family at a Bears game. The first photograph is of the scoreboard in the Giant Center, home of the Bears. Each game for the last two seasons they put this photo up called the nut of the game. People get up and act like nuts while the camera men pan the crowd and put some up on this screen. The reason I post it here is because it is my son on the left and his friend Dillon on the right. The photo was taken a few years ago when the Bears were playing a playoff game. Last season when the Caps made it to the playoffs it was a photo on their home page.

The other photo was taken two Saturday's ago at a home game, that is my wife Linda and son Shane during a stop in play, we set in the fourth row close the Bears bench. With the team we have this year it looks like we will be watching hockey into June again this year. GO BEARS.

Let's Go Bears, Let's Go Bears!!

After all the wildlife photographs it is time to slip some hockey photos into the mix. For those that have followed this blog for sometime now you know my family is a big hockey family. We have season tickets to the AHL Hershey Bears and travel to Washington to see our NHL team the Capitols. The Bears and Caps are in first place at the time I am posting this, I do scheduled post to make life easier. The Bears have also been a scoring machine already out scoring the next closest team by 26 goals. The other week we watched them blow out Binghampton 9-0and just this past Saturday they did it again in a 9-0 rout of the Phantoms. The photo is of Greg Amadio, Greg is playing his first season with the Bears coming over from Binghampton this year, Saturday he scored two goals, one short handed for his first prefessional multi goal game. Greg bring toughness to the team and also plays good hard hockey. The video was taken with my phone at the November 15TH game against the Philadelphia Phantoms. Hershey was losing the game 3-2 in the third period before scoring five goals to take the win. The video last 1 minute and 13 seconds and is Grant McNeil dishing out some punishment. Unfortunately Grant fractured his wrist and will be out for awhile.

A Firehouse Thanksgiving...

Being a fireman means spending time away from home during the holidays. We are not alone in working the holidays many others like police officers, ambulance workers, Doctors, nurses and military personnel also work holidays. After working a few you get used to it, except for Christmas. This Thanksgiving my platoon worked the daylight shift. It ended up being a busy day running eight calls during our daylight, all oven fires or cooking related.

Starting the Thanksgiving after the September 11, 2001 attacks on US soil a tradition began in the Fire Bureau. The Kesher Israel Congregation began cooking a Thanksgiving meal for the on duty shifts. The congregation shows up shortly before noon to feed the on duty platoon leaving enough food to feed the night shift when they come on at 4:00 p.m.

Part of the contingent is the Rosenberg family. Some of us have gotten to know them and watch their boys grow each year. A few years ago the middle son earned his Eagle Scout and my truck partner and I attended his Eagle court of honor. This year I learned that the youngest son is awaiting his board of review for Eagle. As an Eagle Scout myself I enjoy attending the ceremony, knowing the commitment it takes to earn the rank and plan on attending his court of honor when it takes place. We greatly appreciate the effort the congregation puts forth for us on this day and know that it comes from their hearts.

Part of doing this is seeing the press show up at the firehouse, some of us because we have been around awhile are able to avoid them, but we do not mind sacrificing others for the camera. In the top photo Leon Cliatt (Wagon 3) does an interview from the drivers seat of the tower for channel 21 news. Not wanting this to go unnoticed I had to snap a few photos. The second photo is channel 8 interviewing El Shakkur (Tower 3) about his hot sauce. We have another tradition in the Fire Bureau, when a firefighter gets their photo in the paper or show up on the news they owe a us a beer. I hope to reap the rewards later this month after the local meeting, so bring money guys.