He's coming closer, fast enough to reach you in a few seconds. Pan as he goes by, and he's gone in a heartbeat. And you can't ask for a repeat.

I'm talking about a bird flying past or a charging bison, right? Well, maybe and maybe not. There's a connection between sports and wildlife, and watching or photographing one hones your skills for the other. Learning the rules of the game helps you understand what you see and makes it a whole lot more fun. Learning the wildlife game's rules enhances your fun there, too, and may mean the difference between great pictures and none worth keeping.

Bike races help your wildlife viewing
In a dual slalom mountain bike race, two competitors take their fastest line around the flags and pedal like crazy to beat the other guy. They make somewhat predictable paths down the course, but you won't know if somebody's going to skid out on a turn and crash, or how tight those turns will be, or who's going to launch into a jump. That's part of what makes it fun.

Competitors take more predictable lines on cross-country mountain bike race courses. You can always get a view of racers slowly cranking uphill, taking the shortest possible route around the course's taped boundaries to minimize the sweat.

Wildlife have courses they follow too, but they aren't marked with flags or tape. Animals usually take the easiest path to places they found food in before. I was hiking Glacier National Park's Highline Trail along the Continental Divide on a warm September day, a cleared, well-marked trail below craggy mountains that's used by hundreds of people every week. After I'd said hello to several passing hikers, what looked like a white rug moving towards me in the distance resolved itself into a 180-pound mountain goat walking determinedly down the trail. It was the easiest way for him to travel to fresh grass beyond Haystack Butte. And he knew nobody would challenge him for the right of way!

Predictable Raptors
Most raptors have a little routine they follow. I've watched red-tailed hawks preen for 30 minutes or more, stretch up, down, right and left, then defecate to lighten their load before taking off to find breakfast. Bald and golden eagles return to the same nests year after year to raise new families, and that's why you get eagle's nests 20 feet deep on power towers, cliffs and tall trees. If you know where the nests are, you get to watch new families every spring.

Their urge to nest and raise young gives you the most reliable views of birds, next to favorite food sources like groves of dead trees for woodpeckers. Communal nesters like egrets and cliff swallows concentrate their nests in one spot. Parents return with food for helpless (altricial) nestlings countless times every day. Like any good spectator sport, find your place in the 'stadium' for a great view.

Even active, precocial young like American avocets and black-necked stilts stay ground-bound until they grow feathers and fly off. Until the fledging day, nervous parents watch their kids dip into shallow water for food with an occasional rest under parental feathers for downy young avocets. All the parents can do is make noise and fly at possible predators while their brood runs away to hide. But the little birds can't go far, and knowing the paths they walk while they hunt lets you watch them from beyond their threat distance.

Flying terns imitate racers
Panning a camera to follow a bike racer polishes the same skills for following terns in flight. Watch flight patterns for awhile and you'll see where wind, tree, and food locations channel the birds. They funnel predictably around obstacles, so once they show you where they're going you can follow pretty easily with your camera or binoculars using skills and reflexes you've developed tracking competitors in your favorite sport.

One evening after missing young stilts where I'd seen them a couple weeks earlier, I watched Forster's terns wheeling in a large circle and hovering over a wide slough at high tide in California's Palo Alto Baylands. There were always one or two birds scanning for small fish they'd dive into the water to grab. Terns dive whenever they see fish, and their unpredictability makes good splash-dive pictures really tough. But these guys flew pretty repeatable patterns so I moved to put the warm setting sunlight in their faces and started tracking them with my camera and 400mm lens. I managed several flight shots, including one with a tern carrying away a small fish dinner.

So enjoy those action sports. They can help you watch and photograph wildlife!

Congratulations to Jan Alexander who guessed March's merlin. Many of you figured out April's mystery bird, but Bill Walker recognized the eared grebe before anyone else. Both got free 8X10 prints of the birds they correctly identified.

Here are two views of this month's mystery critter:

First correct guesser gets an 8X10 print of the full image. But you only have until June 5 to email your name and guess to contest@mountain-and-desert.com.
    Good luck!!

And choose another unmounted 8X10 print FREE with your order! Just type "free 8X10" and the image number in the 'Comments' part of the order form. (Scroll down after you click.)

Icons of the American West exhibit at REI Coop, Saratoga, California
Bison fighting on the plains. Anasazi ruins. Desert marshes and high mountains above colorful autumn leaves. See all of this and more in stunning 12X18 photographs at REI Coop, 400 El Paseo de Saratoga, Saratoga, California. The show runs April 10 through May 31. Click for an online preview.

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