John Gerlach Loc: Island Park, Idaho

The four week-long photo tours I led in Yellowstone enjoyed super weather and plenty of special photo opportunities. Each week saw plenty of sunny days - great for thermal areas - along with some cloudy days that work well for waterfalls, and even a snowy period or two - sometimes heavy snow and I like that for wildlife. Cold and clear nights are so important for frost development in the geyser basins. Wildlife sightings were a little down this year and we never saw bobcats unlike most years. Sadly, one friendly bobcat that ended up in West Yellowstone decided to take a tour of the wolf enclosure at the Grizzly Bear and Wolf Discovery Center and the wolves showed no mercy. Trumpeter swans were in good numbers along the rivers, though, coyotes were spotted catching some of them. Elk are common at Mammoth, but almost unseen along the Madison River between West Yellowstone and Madison Junction where they used to be plentiful. The wolves have been eating the wintering population of elk since their introduction, and now they are either almost gone, or the few remaining are hiding really well. We spotted two wolves at night while riding in our snowcoach, but none in the day. Red fox were seen once in a while, and coyotes a little more often. One group got about two hours to photograph a coyote hunting voles in a meadow not far from Madison Junction. Every winter is different in Yellowstone, and 2019 was a superb year for landscape photography with all the fresh snow and cold frosty mornings.

I posted a blog about the photo strategies I use and teach in Yellowstone. One thing you will notice if you read the blog is I greatly prefer all manual exposure for winter scenes. Though I do use Auto ISO when it is necessary due to quickly changing light, since snow scenes require so much plus exposure compensation to get a suitable exposure, I find it is much easier to achieve that using manual exposure. The problem with all autoexposure methods in snow scenes is first you need some positive exposure compensation to achieve white snow, and then the amount of exposure compensation set by the camera varies as the metering system "sees" more or less white snow from shot to shot, even though the light is normally steady and the exposure should not vary in most cases. For example, in the case of Palette springs on a dark cloudy afternoon, the ambient light is not changing, so once I have my exposure set on manual, I had the same good exposure for every composition and there were a lot of them.

Here is my blog on some winter photo tips for Yellowstone. I have been fortunate to spend over 500 winter days in Yellowstone photographing the wonders there over the decades, and plan to continue that for as long as possible.

https://www.gerlachnaturephoto.com/single-post/2019/02/17/Winter-Yellowstone-Photography-Strategies

Coyote getting ready to pounce on a vole

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Coyote passing by me full-frame with my 800mm Canon lens

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Bison that has been pushing the snow with its face

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Mud Volcano area

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Paulette Spring

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Firehole fall

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Frosted Lodgepoles

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Paulette spring

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Beryl springs sunstar

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Trumpeter Swan in the Madison River

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DaveO Loc: Northeast CT

Got some really nice shots and thanks for labeling!

MarciaES

Your pictures & narrative remind me of back in the late 1980's - 2000 when a group of us would go out to Yellowstone either over MLK weekend or President's Day weekend. We stayed at the Stagecoach Inn in W. Yellowstone & one day go to Old Faithful, another to the Canyon area, and the 3rd to Mammoth. Always lots of elk along the Madison R. between W. Yellowstone & Madison Junction. There was also a decent size herd of buffalo just before we got to Madison Junct. too. Back then we rented snowmobiles from some place in W. Yellowstone and didn't need a guide to take us so if we wanted to stop along the groomed roads to see something, we could - like lots of wildlife! What fun times & great memories. For 3 days while we were there all the cares & worries of our lives & the world just disappeared.

cedymock Loc: Irmo, South Carolina

Such a beautiful place; John thank you for sharing your wonderful photos.

Wilderness Images Loc: Apache Junction, AZ.

Looks like you were having some fun out there. Great series of shots.

Jack Olson

John Gerlach Loc: Island Park, Idaho

I remember those days too! I wish we still had the freedom to do that, but perhaps it would be too crowded now.

wapiti Loc: round rock, texas

John,
You are absolutely correct about the elk in Yellowstone. The last time that I was there,2011, there were hardly any elk to be found. I haven't been back since for that reason. The same in Grand Teton. There were once places in YNP and GNP where you could absolutely be certain of finding elk in the fall. Those days are gone and it really pisses me off. I live in Austin, TX. and since 1963, I've been to Yellowstone over 30 times, each time in the fall. It's unlikely that I will ever go back because of what the wolves have done to the elk.

Longshadow Loc: Audubon, PA, United States

Great set.

Blurryeyed Loc: NC Mountains.

Very Nice!

DragonsLady Loc: Los Alamos, NM

Your blog was very enlightening. Would love to go on your photography excursions but aging bodies and a dislike for extreme cold make it unlikely. So I'll enjoy your pictures.

MT native Loc: Big Sky Country — Montana

Outstanding images of Yellowstone. Thanks for sharing.

Jay Pat Loc: Round Rock, Texas, USA

Beautiful images!!!
Pat

kpmac Loc: Ragley, La

Nice set.

RichardTaylor Loc: Sydney, Australia

Super set.

Earnest Botello Loc: Hockley, Texas

Very good series, John.