Monday, May 7, 2018

Baby And Mama On The Range ...


“The wildlife and its habitat cannot speak, so we must and we will …”
              ~ Theodore Roosevelt
                 ~ 1858-1919
             ~ Naturalist & Conservationist
          ~26th President of the
                  United States of America
                        ~ 1901-1909
What a sweet baby bison, and the first I’ve ever photographed!

I captured this beautiful female American Bison calf with her mother on a late August evening three months after her birth at Trexler Nature Preserve, Schnecksville, Pennsylvania, where bison live as a herd on the hillsides of the 1,100-acre preserve’s Central Range.

When the late General Harry C. Trexler established the preserve in the early 1900s, he did it to save the American bison, elk and white-tailed deer from extinction and assure the species’ survival.

A conservationist along the lines of Theodore Roosevelt and John Muir, General Trexler understood the importance of nature and preserving wildlife in its natural habitat.

A successful businessman who amassed a fortune in the timber and cement industries and founded the Pennsylvania Power and Light Company, General Trexler began purchasing small farms in the low hills of Lehigh County in 1906. By 1913, he had transported eight bison and 20 Virginia white-tailed deer to the preserve. The elk followed soon after.

When General Trexler died in 1933, he bequeathed the property to the residents of Lehigh County. Today, the Trexler Nature Preserve is open to the public for passive recreation and nature watching.

The American Bison was designated the first national mammal of the United States on May 9, 2016. The majestic bison joins the bald eagle as a national symbol.

Thursday, May 3, 2018

A Lowcountry Morning ...



“Let us cross over the river, and rest in the shade of the trees.”
            ~ Stonewall Jackson
               ~  1824-1863
The last words of Thomas Jonathan “Stonewall” Jackson, who served as a Confederate general (1861-1863) during the Civil War, and became arguably the best-known Confederate commander after General Robert E. Lee. Jackson played a prominent role in nearly all military engagements in the Eastern Theater of the war until his death, and had an important part in winning many significant battles.

A Great Blue Heron peers through the marsh in the still beauty of a southern fall morning in the Lowcountry just before the fog burns off along the Colleton River in Beaufort County, South Carolina on the first day of November in Dixie.