Posts Tagged ‘Texas’A Delicious BassSunday, April 11th, 2010
After one of the coldest Texas winters I can remember, it was nice to get out last week and sling flies on a warm, muggy day. The newspaper said that the greenies were up shallow on Lake Bastrop, and that’s exactly how we found them. Since hungry, jumping largemouths don’t really need much in the way of explanation, I’ll skip the captions and the rhetoric and let the camera talk. Click here to see more shots from my bass fishing stock photo archive.
Point!Monday, March 1st, 2010
Folks who know me will attest that quail hunting is one of several things that I get all yippy about. Unfortunately the 2009-10 Texas bird crop wasn’t much to yip for. After two consecutive blistering summers there were scant few coveys and lots of bird dogs and hunters riding the bench. I actually went the entire season without firing a shot, but just before the final bell I did get to fire a few frames on one of the rare patches of Texas ground that held a huntable density of birds. By nod from Joe Crafton and Bubba Wood with Park Cities Quail in Dallas, I tagged along on a two-day hunt to photograph a group of quail aficionados at Mesa Vista Ranch in the Texas Panhandle. Owner T. Boone Pickens had graciously donated the hunt to raise funds for the Rolling Plains Quail Research Ranch, and his guests were treated to a literal hunt of a lifetime. Through extensive water management and habitat improvement, Boone has transformed what was once a large piece of dusty cow country into one of the most productive quail factories in the Southwest. Rainfall goes a long way to fuel quail production, but during drought times Mesa Vista makes sure that the key components of water, forage, nesting, and screening cover are still abundantly intact. In a year when quail slipped way down the priority list for most, Boone’s dogs got a workout, his guides stayed busy, his hunters found coveys, and a pile of money was raised for quail research. Winner winner, chicken dinner. After the hunt, I poured a selection of the photos into a hardbound mini coffee table book and a slideshow CD for the attending hunters. Those items will also be used to jumpstart the bidding on the Mesa Vista 2011 hunt that will be auctioned off next week at the annual Park Cities Quail fundraiser. This was a rewarding project for all involved. Click here to see these, and more shots from my quail and upland bird hunting archive.
Mesa Vista Ranch
Chest-high to a bird dog
Scatterguns and plum thickets
You can run, but you can’t hide
Skint back
Hunkered in a creekdraw
This season’s most valuable player
The Heart of DucknessSaturday, January 16th, 2010
After the New Year I got in a couple of Texas coastal duck hunts with my son, Blake, and friend Brad Smythe. I shot my first ducks around Rockport nearly forty years ago (damn I’m old), and until I reached my teens, I wasn’t even sure that ducks would land on fresh water. I’ve hunted them in lots of places, since then, but I always enjoy returning to the spot where I once had to stand on the boat seat to shoot coots off the water with a side-by .410. We had exactly the fowl/foul weather that we needed to get the ducks moving, so instead of stacking away more cloudy-day shots with standard color levels, I decided to play around with Photoshop. Using high contrast, sepia layers, and vignettes, I came up with a variety of tones and saturations. Some were taken all the way down to grayscale, and in others I let a few of the highlight colors pop through. As much as I often lament the loss of our film culture, I do sometimes enjoy a little nerdlike post-processing. If you’re needing shots for an upcoming article or promo, I’ve got a pile of duck hunting images in my online stock photo archive. I’ve also setup a cool (new to me) form of delivery using iDisk. High-res downloads are available within minutes, as long as I’m not too far from my desk. My keyword system is based on species, location, and action words; here are few sample phrases to get you started: Sample Duck Hunting Keywords In a couple of weeks I’ll be heading to New Orleans to fish/photograph bruiser marsh redfish with Captain Bryan Carter. Stay tuned for some cool, new views.
Shoot 'Em!Sunday, December 20th, 2009
Last week I traveled to the Texas Panhandle for my annual goose and crane extravaganza with Blackfoot Guide Service. This is one of my favorite hunts, and the 2009 version was one of the best we’ve had in years. For a change, we had normal weather: lows in the 20′s and highs in the 50′s with sunny skies. That beats the zero year when we had to chip pack ice from our nostrils, and the flood year when we couldn’t even get the decoy trailer into the field. The light winds, this time, made the geese a little picky, but only to the point that we needed modified chokes instead of improved cylinders. Yes, these Panhandle geese usually decoy quite nicely. In the afternoons we set up windsock spreads for sandhill cranes in a cut milo field south of Tahoka. If you’ve ever hunted cranes, you’ll know that concealment is the key. It doesn’t matter how good your spread looks when your hulking silhouette stands out like a shark in a bird bath. This year our guides packed us into layout blinds woven with grain stalks that proved to be the missing piece of the puzzle. When the first group of cranes swung in and cupped their wings only thirty feet off the deck, we knew we were in for a great shoot. If you need shots for an upcoming article or promotion, please visit my online archive to see my entire selection of goose hunting and sandhill crane hunting images. High resolution files are available via ftp upload, usually within minutes.
Tools of the trade
Bluebird skies and cautious Canadas, near Lubbock, Texas
Lexie the goose fetching machine
Guide Johnny Miller talking trash
Sandhills on the wing
David Brown hunkering among the stalks
What to shoot when the birds aren’t flying?
Christmas dinner
A goose guide’s mid-season floorboard pile-up
I’ll be shooting some deer hunting photos after Christmas, followed by a couple of duck shoots in January. Thanks to everyone who bought, pimped, and published my work in 2009. Hopefully we’ve survived the worst of a horrendous recession. Happy Holidays to everyone, and I look forward to working/hanging with all of you again in 2010. Stepping Into FallFriday, October 2nd, 2009
Opening Day I managed to get in a couple of shoots between opening day and the first deluge on September 6th, but every planned hunt after that date was a washout. Literally. Below you’ll find a smattering of images that I shot before the rains fell and the early season birds scattered. Hopefully there will be a couple more dove days before other distractions take over.
Return to Versus Country
Coming Up If all goes according to plan, this book will release in the Spring of 2011 through my Departure Publishing imprint. Check back next month for a preview of those images. Unplugged in the Neo-TropicsSunday, July 5th, 2009
Key West
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