An early sunrise and a restful night made for a quick start on this gorgeous June morning on day 2 at McCullough Peaks herd management area. On day 1, the main herd was mostly disinterested in me and they almost entirely kept together in a tight group a good distance away.
With this being my first trip to the area and the herd's tendency to stay together in one big unit, I opted to stay further back and just watch them from a distance on the first afternoon. I packed up camp in hopes of finding them again with the early morning light and cool temperatures. Only a few minutes of driving, and I could see a few members of the group heading my general direction, with the larger group a bit out of sight, but presumably on the same line. I parked the car, grabbed the big 500mm lens and hiked out into the sage where I thought that they may graze next. My spot turned out to be fantastic, as all ~56 of them walked right by me and slowly passed further away. Those images will be posted separately and will eventually appear in a prior post to this one. After the horses passed, I walked back the quarter-mile to the car, grabbed my wider angle lens and then walked out a different direction to the next area where I thought they may graze. Again, they walked right up to me and around.
Many of my journal posts are situations where I don't move an inch. This is another one of those "no-step" situations where I'm in a fixed spot. In this session, I'm using a 100-300mm lens, so there's a bit of zoom action to frame certain shots. No images are cropped in any image in this post, and the main character is in every image (even if not the subject). Similar to almost all of my other journal posts, these images are presented in chronological order. There are hundreds of additional pictures that show more of the herd as they grazed around me, but I've chosen this group of images to share the most memorable part of this particular session.
The posted rules and regulations for this area indicate that visitors should remain 300 feet away and it is a violation to approach, harass or disturb the horses. Technically speaking, I very well could be in violation of that statute, even if the horses are clearly undisturbed. I would argue that I didn't approach, and that it's less of a disturbance to remain still than to get up and leave once they are within a certain distance. I'll happily take the heat or a day in court if it ever comes to it, because I think the images speak for themselves. These horses were most certainly not bothered by my presence, and in fact, many of them found me to be something of a curiosity.
My eye had been on a young horse that kept looking at me intently. Many horses didn't even pay much attention to me, although 20 or so did walk up to within 20 feet for a closer look. I'm not sure of the proper color name of this juvenile, but I'll just refer to it as espresso cream (EC).
He stood out with his great color, dark main and confident personality. More than any other horse, his gaze on me was constant. I was almost certain he would approach, so I kept the lens pointed his direction.
Closer and closer he came. With over 50 horses all around me, I debated what shots to take. Too many options can lead me to be a bit scattered, but I resigned myself to staying in exactly the same spot. I would let the cards fall where they may, even if I might want pics that better showcased the full size of this impressive group.
EC drifted closer as others came right up to me and went on about their way. When a painted horse and fellow juvenile in the herd approached closely, this seemed to be the moment that EC decided he would go ahead and also come take a look at me.
The pair were clearly close, and the painted horse groomed EC for a moment while perhaps only 15 feet away. At one point, it was almost as if the painted horse whispered something in EC's ear as if to dare him to come even closer. EC took several steps forward. Now only 6-8 feet away, both juveniles were content just watching me and smelling the air to get a better sense about me.
In these moments, I often put down the camera to connect more directly with the animal, even if that means potentially sacrificing some shots. EC took that as a cue to come even closer! At about four feet away he was almost too close to focus on, and obviously this distance is risky if not problematic. Every horse was perfectly calm. I was perfectly calm. The body language, demeanor and overall vibe gave me no basis for concern.
I whispered to him that he was too close. He wanted to smell me more closely, and seemed like he wanted to touch me with his nose. At 2 feet away and his nose in the camera, I snapped my second to last shot of this set. He's too close for the lens to focus, but I like the shot because he's just so ridiculously close to the camera.
I remained seated and just let them all pass along as they grazed westward. Eventually the whole group passed by and I got up and returned to the car. Later the horses would drift back to the road. I watched on from nearly a half-mile away at that point. Visitors and even tour buses drove right up to the horses and the group mostly remained undisturbed. I was somewhat surprised that the guided tours got out of the buses and approached the horses. It's different, in my opinion, when horses are on the roads and different when you start 40 ft away and walk up to 20 feet away -- as opposed to going out 1,000 feet away and remaining seated like I did. Even if a couple dozen horses were very close to me, especially EC and roughly 2 feet away, I don't categorize my behavior and the tourist behavior in the same way. I could see the tour bus visitors trying to touch some of the horses, and the horses would react by jerking away from the stranger. Even though I could have touched some of these horses, I didn't attempt it. It's hard to know where to draw the line sometimes, but I do my best to remain ethical and considerate of the situation.
Gorgeous moment with fabulous light. Later that day, I drove a couple miles to the another area of the HMA. This same group, coincidentally, ran over to where I was parked and we'd get another up-close session several hours later.
