Category: Wildlife Photography

A Whitetail Deer Hunter’s Tale It was finally here. The day I’d been waiting for. Opening day of 2025’s Southern zone rifle season. When I was a boy growing up in Saranac Lake, the Southern Tier was shotgun only. They had no rifle hunting season. As a result, two...

One Man’s Journey Backward Through Time Who else besides me grew up watching the morning cartoon “Jonny Quest”? Dr. Quest, Race Bannon, Jonny himself, Hadji, and of course, their dog Bandit. From remote jungle to sea floor, spanning the globe on one peril filled adventure of discovery after another....

Climate Change, Chainsaws & a Camping Chronology This piece begins with a question: How many folks out there have spent ten days or more at a single stretch with family in a remotely pitched ADK camp? I’m not talking about “going into camp”, sitting in hunting camp playing cards...

Congratulations! And welcome. You have now hereby officially entered my completely unauthorized Adirondack Outlaw writer’s social experiment. As you will quite soon discover, this story has absolutely nothing to do with barenaked ladies, bananas, or ice cream. No, this story instead actually chronicles my ongoing efforts to bolster the...

Living the Wildlife ********** The prologue to this story is actually the epilogue to another. It was fall 2024, mid-October. I had just returned home from my annual Southern Tier crossbow deer hunting trip with my son. I’d expended all of my time, money & energy through 2024’s spring...

MIDDLE SARANAC LAKE EDITION It was an early Saturday morning in the middle of July. My brother Ray & I were camped in our usual Middle Saranac Lake Bull Rush Bay lean-to spot. I arose from lean-to embraced slumber, stretched, and went down to the lake to inhale the...

A Tale of Nature & Life & the Fight for Survival The pair of Canada geese we’ve nicknamed “Flo & Moe” returned to our Monroe Wildlife Area in late March, shortly after our main pond ice let out. This would mark approximately the 12th consecutive year that “Flo &...

A Rewarding Investment I built my first set of duck nesting boxes over a decade ago, shortly after digging my three main ponds. Which was a story unto itself that nearly ended right there and then, with me buried underneath the cab of a tipped over still running track...

Before I go any further, I fully acknowledge that, at least in terms of pure total snow volume, winter 2025 was far worse for others than it was for us at The Monroe Wildlife Area here outside of Watertown. Several communities throughout New York State, predominantly along the Tug...

What happens when apex predators collide? The bobcat hunted sunset’s far edge, scent marking territory as it silently stalked evening’s meal. The stealthy cat had been tracking a cottontail rabbit. Eyes, nose and ears honed on its target, the feline moved slowly forward, one step at a time, pausing...