Manners

I’d like to apologize for the image above. I made this photograph ten years ago in a joyful stupor while seeing wild moose for the first time. There were FIVE MOOSE in ONE MEADOW so I happy cried a little bit about that. My camera was old and my lens did not zoom. I was absolutely too close to these Moose. I was nineteen and while that is no excuse for such a ding-dong decision, I cannot say that I regret making this image; It was a once-in-a-lifetime sort of moment and all of the Moose I’ve seen since have been safely far away and sort of ugly. I’d like to apologize nonetheless.

It’s pretty rude to stare at animals if you do it wrong. In fact, staring at animals can be pretty risky if you do it really wrong. Animals don’t always know about human rudeness, so sometimes they don’t know that staring is rude, but other times they become offended. If an animal is offended, he might flee, but he might not flee if he is a confrontational sort of individual, so it is important to stare politely at animals. This is the foundation of my work as a photographer and it will be even more important as I spend the next two-ish years saying no thank you to house parties and refusing to buy alcohol for college sophomores while completing my second undergraduate degree in Wildlife Biology as a “non-traditional” student (31-33 years old.)

While working on my photography degree at Colorado State University in 2009, I changed my mind a lot about what to do, but I never changed my mind about watching wildlife— wondering what they’re up to and why. I’m a professional photographer and an amateur birder and when I watch the birds I’m wishing I was also a professional wildlife watcher. I want to know more about the animals and their busy lives, and more importantly I want to know what to do so we can keep watching. I want other people to wonder what we can do too.

I bought this blog last night at 12:30 AM after quietly freaking out that I might not stand out amongst the 600 vibrant youths in the CSU wildlife program. I spent the next two hours choosing fonts, then another hour fussing with my color calibration because what if the green I chose looks uglier on your computer than it does on mine? I am going to try to channel that manic energy into pestering my way to best friendships with faculty so I can get paid to finally see a beaver or count how many bats in a cave or make pie charts about pigeons, and I’m going to yammer on about it here.

I am wondering if introducing myself in Post Number One as someone who once rudely stared at animals was a bad idea, but you know what? I think honesty is best here and I’m not about to get up on my high cow* about Ethics in Wildlife Conservation because I haven’t taken that class yet. So if you decide to follow along, keep in mind that I am not yet a professional wildlife watcher, and I may have lots to learn. In fact, I hope I have lots to learn because I’m about to spend too many dollars on classes like “Mammalogy” and “Forest Ecology” to learn how to stare at animals for really good reasons.

Thanks for stopping by— I mean it!

*To be up on one’s high cow is like being up on one’s high horse except for the cow is less important and you are probably wrong about whatever you’re up there for anyhow.