Landscapes
A photographic selection of the places and environments around the birds.
When I am looking for birds, my attention is usually drawn to movement, calls and small details. Along the way, I pass through landscapes that are more than a backdrop. Sometimes I photograph them too.
This part of Ardea brings together a deliberately small selection of photographs in which a place, its light and its atmosphere come together particularly strongly. It is not intended to document every area I visit, but to show the landscapes that stayed with me.
Regional series
Montenegro
The route from the Bay of Kotor into northern Montenegro crosses a rapid succession of very different landscapes: dry rocky slopes, deep wooded canyons and the open high country of Durmitor. Around Žabljak, dark conifer forest and glacial lakes sit directly below pale limestone peaks.
Kenai Fjords & Girdwood
From Seward, the route leads through Resurrection Bay into the open Gulf of Alaska and onwards to Aialik Bay. Forested coasts, rock arches and steep peaks alternate with glaciers flowing from the Harding Icefield towards the sea. Farther north around Girdwood, temperate rainforest and wetlands lie below the glaciated Chugach Mountains.
Denali National Park
In the rain shadow of the Alaska Range, boreal forest gives way to open tundra, braided rivers and glaciated mountains. Denali rises beyond a succession of lower ridges, revealing its scale only when the weather allows.
Pacific Northwest
The part of the Pacific Northwest shown in this series is shaped by the contrast between ocean and mountains. In western Washington, the Puget Sound lowlands lie between the Olympic Mountains and the Cascade Range. Rivers, islands, inlets and forested coasts divide the landscape.