Поздний старт позволил фотографу запечатлеть черного медведя, которого он принял за корову

On the Road: Late start to the day bears well This particular black bear was feasting on grass in the Porcupine Hills west of Stavely Article content Nope, that’s not a cow. It was the same dark colour as the cattle in a nearby pasture and when it looked up, it had a mouthful of grass, just like most of its neighbours. But wasn’t quite as tall, had stubby ears. And very un-cow like teeth. Recommended Videos I’d hit the road a little bit later than I’d originally intended. There was a doctor’s appointment I had to go to at mid-morning — checking in after my first round of chemo — which, unfortunately, didn’t take place until more than an hour after it was scheduled. That meant it was getting close to one in the afternoon before I finally cleared the city limits. No big deal, really, and my chemo went well, but it made me change my mind about the day’s wandering. My first thought was to head up toward Dry Island Buffalo Jump and idle my way among the farm fields on the way up and back but with the day half-gone, that might have been a bigger bite than I wanted to take. So instead, I aimed toward High River and then west past Cayley to poke around the countryside there. I was gonna say that that was a wise choice but the truth is you can head pretty much any direction and find fascinating things to see. Like birds on a wire. A flock of starlings was perched shoulder to shoulder on a power line near Cayley, enough of them that their weight was making the wires sag. They are forming big flocks like this to head south ahead of the coming winter and there were several hundred of them in this bunch. A lot of starlings stick around for the winter but these guys looked ready to get the flock outta here! And they weren’t the only birds getting ready to move southward. There were flocks of crows in the hay fields — lots of them stay for the winter, too — and plenty of hawks circling above the crops being harvested. They were a combination of Swainson’s and redtails, most of them young ones just learning to hunt, along with kestrels and even, at one field, a prairie falcon. Cool to watch them circle over the stubble left by the combines, looking down at ground to watch for mice and voles left in the open by the passing machines. Which led me to launch my little drone to have a hawk’s-eye view of the fields myself. I didn’t take off over the field with the birds around, though. Instead I flew up over a windrowed set of fields by Pekisko. They were swathed and laid out in neat rows, still waiting for the combines to come by, so there were no birds hovering above them for the drone to annoy. I sometimes wonder if the hawks, crows, ravens and other birds flying over these geometric patterns ever look down and marvel at the contours of the fields and the stripes and lattices laid out across them. I know I sure do. Fascinating. I made a quick stop at the Bar U Ranch to see what events they had coming up — ranch rodeo fairly soon — and then continued on south toward Chain Lakes before turning off for a short exploration along the Stimson Creek valley. I did give some thought to continuing on up toward Hailstone Butte and the high country but though the tire that plagued me last week was now temporarily fixed, I still didn’t trust it. New tires are on their way, though! For now, the lower part of the valley where the creek meanders through a series of old and new beaver ponds would do. So I launched the little drone again. Looking down from above, the valley was the opposite of the geometric patterns of the grain fields. There were no straight lines anywhere, just a series of undulating curves where the slow-flowing water had carved its way through, a serpentine meandering back and forth as it found varying paths of least resistance. Stands of willows marked old water courses while small ponds stood where the creek had cut off bends and left them stranded. Once again, fascinating. Which the reservoir at Chain Lakes decidedly is not. There were cormorants perched on an old dead tree that had snagged on a reef near the dam and some pretty sparkles from the ripples on the water but not much more than that. What was pretty cool, though, were the Columbia ground squirrels. These little rodents, cousins of our familiar gophers — Richardson’s ground squirrels — go to bed very early and rise very late. Though there were still a few of them out and about, all of them this year’s young, by the middle of the month they’ll all be tucked in their burrows where they’ll stay until at least mid-April. Nice to see a few of them still around. Beyond that, there wasn’t much there. I did see a flicker dive in among the branches of a spruce tree to avoid a kestrel — it looked relieved to have escaped those claws — and stopped below the dam to see if there was a dipper around. Nothing there, though, but one very elusive spotted sandpiper and poplars with wind-worn leaves. It was mid-afternoon now, not late by any means, but it seemed like time to start closing the circle and heading back home. But first I rolled just a little ways further south to check out a slough where I’ve often seen sandhill cranes. There were hunters in the area, though, so the cranes, if there were any hanging around, weren’t out in the open. Not that the hunters would have bothered them — no reason to — but the presence of people might have made them shy. Maybe they’ll be around next spring. There were other hunters there, too, these ones avian. At least five harriers were flying low over the reeds, swooping down whenever they saw something they might be able to eat. Amazing flyers, these guys. I backtracked a bit to Riley Road now and followed that along the south fork of Willow Creek. More hunters here, too, so not a lot of wildlife along the road. A few yellow leaves, though. Getting to be that time. And big, black cattle. Several bunches were grazing along the hillsides and in the ditches beside the road so it wasn’t much of a surprise to see what I thought was one munching grass among the willows next to a tiny spring-fed creek. And I was well past it when I realized, nope, that wasn’t a cow. It was too short, had small ears and teeth that would have worked just as well for grazing on grass or tearing at meat. Yeah, that’s not a cow. That’s a bear. It took me a couple of seconds to get the camera aimed and grab a couple pictures but there was a very annoying branch sticking up right in front of the bruin’s face so I backed up a couple of feet to get a better angle. Naturally, the bear began to walk away. Dammit, I thought, but at least I had a couple of pictures, crappy as they were. But the bear hadn’t seemed like it was fleeing my presence; it seemed more to be just grazing along. So I pulled ahead a few metres to where I could see an opening among the willows. And there was the bear. It stood up on its hind legs to get a look over the willows and gazed around. It was more brown than black out in the sunshine, more of a dark cinnamon colour. A single blade of bright green grass hung in the corner of its mouth. Interestingly, it wasn’t looking at me like I thought it would be. Instead, it seemed to be gazing at something across the road. But I kept my eyes glued to the camera so I have no idea what it saw. A few seconds later it dropped back down again and went on grazing behind the curtain of willows. I thanked it for the poses and drove on. Smiling, I headed over the ridge to the main Willow Creek valley — found a blue heron at a beaver dam and more harriers patrolling the wetlands — and then cut east toward Pine Coulee and Stavely. It seemed a bit smoky here so I kept rolling and hoped it might clear. Afternoon light on the fields would be lovely. It never did clear but I found a handsome ferruginous hawk that posed for me and a slightly scruffy golden eagle. A sharptail grouse was reluctant to get off the road so I slowed down and stopped beside it to have a look. With the window rolled down I could hear it clucking and realized she was calling for her babies. They ran right in front of the truck and into the ditch where momma was. Glad I stopped! The light was getting muddier but it looked nice on a heron hunting the shallow water at another slough. By now, though, I was hungry so I stopped for a burger in Nanton and then headed back to town. The day had started later than I would have liked but that had led me to several things I wouldn’t have seen otherwise. Like the ground squirrels and herons and hawks and field patterns and that dark shape among the willows. Nope, that definitely wasn’t a cow.