Program

Wayne Wolfersberger will present a program on photographing bears of Yellowstone. I have spent 14 summers (May to September) in Yellowstone working as a ranger naturalist from 1999 through 2012. I have spent hundreds of hours just watching bears while waiting to get that special photograph, sometimes standing next to the likes of Tom Mangelsen or Bob Landis the videographer, but mostly by myself or a few other friends. I plan to share some photographic techniques, ecology and personal stories of some of the bears I have “known” and photographed over the years. Some I have photographed as they have grown from sub adults to breeding adults. Unfortunately two that I have photographed a lot are the two that recently were euthanized after killing three individuals in the park in 2011 and 2015. I will talk about some of the bears we have named the Pooh Bear, the Circus Bear, the Water Bear and the Chicken Bear as well as Old Scarface. I will include images of the grizzly’s chief competitor the wolf and many of its food sources to blend the program into an ecological account of the bear as well as a photographic presentation.

Background

I have been interested in photographing wildlife since childhood. I fell in love with the natural world from seeing all the birds visit my parent’s bird feeder in the backyard in Arlington, but back then the camera was secondary. After moving to another area in Arlington where there was a local swamp, I became more interested in reptiles and amphibians. In my very early teens, I wanted to be a herpetologist. I did a lot of bird watching as well. “I always took the family Kodak Brownie Hawkeye when we would go on family trips and always urged my parents to take side trips to various nature type places near to the Disneyland or beach resorts etc. so I could photograph the wildlife”. I have lots of pathetic pictures of animal life from these trips. “One thing that impacted me the most was when my family made a trip during my high school years to the West. We traveled to many of the national parks but my favorite was Yellowstone. I wanted to return.”

I received a BS from the U of MD in Conservation and Resource Management took a job in Yellowstone between his sophomore and Junior years. His job was washing dishes in the local cafeteria, but he hiked a lot, partied a lot and started taking pictures of large wildlife. I bought my first SLR camera – a Kodak Retina Reflex III, replacing it later with the first SLR Nikon, the F1. This was when I started getting serious about photography, reading some books on wildlife photography, working for a commercial photographer and taking a lot of pictures during class field trips to nature preserves for ecological studies.
I worked for the US Fish and Wildlife Service as a research biologist at the Patuxent Wildlife Research Center in Laurel Maryland. Later, I joined the Navy (during the Vietnam War) and ended up working at the US Navy Photo Lab in DC. After leaving the Navy, I taught biology and used the camera in the classroom and on many of the ecology field trips but mainly took pictures of kids in the field working. Through the years, I did weddings, school shots and craft fairs. I joined NVPS in the 1980’s and gained a lot of valuable experiences by participating in evening activities and field trips and serving in various board roles, including President.
Before, during and after retiring from the teaching field (Fairfax County Public Schools 30 years and VTech for eight years part time) I have had images published in local and national calendars, post cards and magazines (including Nature’ Best as well as having had gallery shows both solo and with others. Since retiring, I have been teaching photography courses through FCPS and now, with FCPA. I also do workshops at Oatlands. This challenges me to try new techniques and keep abreast of all the new stuff that keeps coming out in the photo world. In addition to the basic and advanced classes, I also do private lessons. (See listings in website: waynewolfersberger.com).