A black bear sow in a Wild Cherry tree. This sow was eating wild cherries with her three cubs. She would break the limbs off to get the cherries, amazing power for her size. I took this image on Hyatt Lane in Cades Cove in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park in Tennessee with a Nikon D1X with a 300mm f/4 AFS ED-IF lens with a 1.4X Tele-converter. That put my setup at around 640mm...so I was a long way from this bear. Thank you for looking and have a blooming day! Click here to see this image larger
Oh man! That's National Geographic quality! I was holding my breath to see what lens you were using... so glad it was a "long" one.
That's a great photo! We have bears moving into Texas from Louisiana from the east, and from Mexico from the south. If I see a bear, I'll call you (without benefit of telephone, just wait to hear a big yell from Texas) and you can photograph it.
Here's another shot of the same bear after she came down on the ground. Click here to see this image larger
We had bears like that in Wisconsin but I never wanted to be around one to take a picture. Thanks for taking one for us. dooley
I think she looks a little thin. If she has three cubs she probably needs all the cherries she can get for herself and them. dooley
Brilliant picture,..i can almost smell that bear smell,..nearest i ever got to a wild bear was 30 feet,..everyone was screaming at me,..duh,.it looked cute and a Grizzily with the hump,..i knew it was dangerous,..but there was a guy between me and the bear, The Bear is bottom right. ( photo / image / picture from Philip Nulty's Garden )
Philip, remember you don't have to outrun the bear, you just have to outrun the other guy ! That bear looks pensive in the second photo--probably thinking about her next meal.
