Pronghorn SUNSET SNACK (Antilocapra americana) Yellowstone National Park, Monotana ©Christopher Dodds www.chrisdoddsphoto.com Canon EOS 1DsMKII, 500mm F4 and 2XII tele-converter Gitzo 1325 tripod & Wimberley Head II. ISO 250, F9 1/500s Manual.
I've been busy making submissions and came across a folder from my last trip to Yellowstone. I love looking through folders of images from past trips and remembering (visually) the great times had. Photography, for me, is about the time in the field with your subject, but I am fortunate to also spend a lot of time with great friends. The day before this image was captured, I was with a great friend photographing Bison (Buffalo, as they are sometimes called). We had left our car and walked about half a mile (or more) to our subjects, when the biggest bull bison in the herd decided to charge us. What do you do when a 900-pound, horned mass charges you? Seriously! (Insert laughter here) My friend lifted his tripod and shouldered the rig, only to realize, too late, that the lens plate had not properly mated with the clamp on his tripod head. To make a long story short; that was the second time my friend had to have emergency surgery on a long lens (that I know about - smile). Always double check your equipment, fasteners, clamps and straps before you venture out into the field.
Pronghorn SUNSET SNACK II (Antilocapra americana) Yellowstone National Park, Monotana ©Christopher Dodds www.chrisdoddsphoto.com Canon EOS 1DsMKII, 500mm F4 and 2XII tele-converter Gitzo 1325 tripod & Wimberley Head II. ISO 250, F9 1/500s Manual.
Battling Pronghorns (Antilocapra americana) Yellowstone National Park, Monotana ©Christopher Dodds www.chrisdoddsphoto.com Canon EOS 1DsMKII, 500mm F4 and 2XII tele-converter Gitzo 1325 tripod & Wimberley Head II. ISO 250, F8 1/1000s Manual.
North America's swiftest mammal - the graceful and agile Pronghorn (Antilocapra americana) - can leap 20 feet in a single bound and is able to sprint over prairies and sagebrush flats at speeds of 60 miles per hour. Sometimes called the American antelope, the pronghorn is unique; it has no close relatives and is virtually unchanged from ancestors that roamed the earth some 2 million years ago.
Mainly brown, with two white stripes across the chest, a large white rump patch with hairs that are raised in warning when danger looms, and two-pronged horns, the creature is easily recognized. Males are strongly territorial and compete with each other for harems during the autumn rut. The fawns, often twins, are born the following spring. True to their heritage, they can run faster than humans within days of their birth. Pronghorns feed in the morning and evening, grazing on grasses and weeds and occasionally on shrubs.
Many familiar farm animals, and their wild relatives as well, are ungulates - mammals with hooves. Made of a tough hornlike substance, hooves are, in effect, heavy -duty fingernails that cover and protect the toes. Wild horses have only one hoofed toe per foot, cattle have two, and pigs have four. Moose in the north woods, pronghorns on the prairie, and sheep and goats in the barnyard are other well-known examples of animals with hooves.