Fall’s Bounty

Everything in Montana is sped up. The rolling Plains, high Mountain cirques, and deep canyons will soon morph into snowy, windswept, barren survival zones. Summer explodes green and abundant. Long days and a frenzied nut gathering pace, always the winters harshness too near. Between it all, Fall’s Bounty.

The recipe for a Tiger Trout. Brookies and brown’s at a creek mouth in the Absarokee wilderness. Usually, these two species inhabit different kinds of riverscape and do not meet on the grounds. This spot was a small swampy series of ponds w!here one little gravel bed existed just deep and clean enough to make more wild fish

Late summer velvet, friends now, rivals later.

A true 7×7, bugler of the cottonwood bottom. First frost means the haunting cry of the Wapiti ringing around the valley at first light.

Last redoubt for the iconic Griz, high in the scree in search of calories. Iconic and always humbling.

Aspens are the first to pop and a rare chance to see the color pallet blanketed by an early morning snow cell. Grasshopper Valley, white thunder

Death from above, the deadfall hunter. A great gray in the woods at Georgetown Lake.

The perfect specimen. A male brookie, dainty and proud sporting his fall colors.

Battle wagon patrolling his cottonwood bottom. The bugles and posturing rarely turn into a brawl, but if it does a cacophony of brute strength and violence follows.

Deep in a holding pool, the apex predator fish colored up, fat and ready for the final upstream run. Snorkeling in the wilderness and going eye to eye with these leviathans is as close as one can get to the source.

Falls progression. First the Aspens stands that paint the hillsides, then the cottonwoods of the river bottoms, finally the forest larches. All a spectacle to see and a warning to the observant.

Falls clearing skies over a sod roof homestead. A humble abode to survive winters bite.

The one that roams the sage and scales the mountainsides. A deer made for the high-country, rugged and tough. On point having evolved next to North Americas most impressive predators.

Off her red and into the sky.

Where the prairie meets the mountains, a silverback roaming for its last meal before winters long sleep.

Big shouldered loud and proud. The predator from beneath the overhang shows himself for falls dance.

Somewhere in a cold seep, where ice age water pours from its underground labyrinth, a prime brook trout makes it way to where it came from

The mighty moose, a warrior on stilts towers over the bogs and river bottoms it calls home. His deep grunts a warning to anything in its way. Shoulders and antlers built from a summer of foraging for a fall of battling.

The speed goat, its secret is to stay in the open anything that comes must first catch it. The antelope evolved next to the north American cheetah. The big cat is gone, long extinct, but the speed remains.

The whitetail at sunset.

Once the tiller and fertilizer of the head high grass of the Great Plains. Calories for all, the iconic Bison now relegated to small home ranges once moved like water thousands of miles with no restraint.

Glacial and cold, water comes down from the wilderness while the kokanee go up.

The glowing fall light bouncing around the cottonwoods paint everything yellow

A bighorn as good as it gets. Horns and bone, the middle linebacker of creatures.

showing off a color pallet only nature could paint

Cow called him out of his haunt, big tines and a bellow that rang through the cirque. Up and over, deep into the deadfall away from the tag toting humanoids!

Last light in the river bottom.

Over the rainbow rocks of the north country. Vagabonds with great range, Bull trout find refugia above the farm fields.

A late fall northern lights display over the old smelter. P burg Montanica!

Before the trees get their colors, the high alpine tundra light up yellow and red. Last jaunt into the high country, Gallatin Peak. The north Lee Metcalf still wild in spite of what lies to its south.

Wilderness wild, a bull trout and his harem. Finding them deep in the backcountry is always done on just a hunch. Peering into hole after hole, wending thru deadfall and over log jams. Griz tracks criss cross the sand, the pursuit and hunt is on. With luck the drysuit goes on and we meet on their turf.

An enigma wrapped in a mystery, how so does a river that flows out of the snowiest Mountains thru an empty valley at high elevation go warm and dry every year? The Big Hole, a place of study and collaboration!

The hunters moon drives the wapiti out of hiding, craziness coursing thru his vein, only one thing can satiate the appetite. The season for battle is upon the.

So goes above so goes beneath. Falls cacophony of activity and change pushes ever faster as the light fades and the temps drop.

A glacier sunrise.

Upper Rock Creek, refugia for the indomitable Westslope Cutthroat. The cold keeps the nonnatives at bay while the tine cricks protection for the genes.

Gallatin River fall colors, Yellowstone’s Northwest drainage a warning for all who care to listen and see.

Speed goat family group. Safety in numbers is the antelope’s survival strategy, the herd sees all and turbo mode can be initiated if it is such decided.

That one week where the cottonwoods and Larches peak, yellows and blues turn the landscape into a colorful riot before the dark and white descend from the north.

Westslope larches, a certain elevation band lights up, a pine tree of rare beauty.

sacred ground, tread wisely if at all.

wending southward, North Forks are always where the deepest mysteries lay. Deep and dark, cold and dank. Less open and more locked in where the shade hides its deepest mysteries.

The secretive high elevation larch. Before anything else, up at tree line if one hikes to these secretive cirques, one will witness this unique species. They make their home where other trees end and the rock begins.

Gallatin River blues and yellows. Snowfall in the canyon.

Framed in, big trees, big legs, big antlers, and big attitude.

Larch reflection, Swan Range. early morning frost and a glassy lake. It is all zen.

Big sheets of color paint Glaciers northern flanks.

Rays of light thru the cloudscape. North Fork Flathead River. Islands of larches and distant snow.

Slow shutter outlet crick. Light sneak thru to light of the UFO clouds over the big peaks of Glacier national park.

The swan/Seeley. A valley a little bit west and a little bit east. Chock full of larches with towering mountain ranges where only the hardiest go.

A high elevation desert. Valley bottoms herd the water downward to two different oceans. The divide rings out the snowfall and creates two different worlds often times within sight.

Rock creek Homestead, Eking out survival is a thing here.

Just outside the wilderness, clear and cold water always flows. The wilderness is a bank that saves its moisture in deep veins then releases into canyons, valley seeps, and Coldwater lakes.

A slow shutter capture over the rainbow rocks.

Montana’s Banana belt. The Bitterroot, a respite and wintering grounds for first nation people away from the bone chilling winds of the east side.

Larches in the rocks

Big Hole River Montana, the yellows and reds. Below mirrors the above as fall powers on.

Flint Creek family group

Up on the gravel bars, a brookie flashes its tail for the camera.

A patch of yellow amongst the rock and ice. The high elevation larch is a thing for the west slope. Not everywhere but some where.

My little studio. I am around all winter, message me up for a visit! Thanks All for keeping me doing what I do!

The front, wild and lonely, remote, windy and cold. Stronghold for all the wildest things. Bighorns after sunset.

Speed Goats slow shutter capture herd on the move.

Full curl dance of the bighorn. Icon of the west, stout and strong.

Motion capture, brookies in a crystal clear seep.

The battleground, Two 6×6’s decide to risk it all in battle.

Colors in the sky, colors below the surface. The river and mountainsides bouncing falls reds.

A place where a river starts. Headwaters of the Clearwater, a large spring fed sink. Mountain moisture sinks into the mountain side reemerging below ringed by larch.

Give a holler if you want to swing in this winter.

Kootenai falls Kokanee, He won’t make but it won’t stop him from trying!