You can always count on getting great photos on our Silver Salmon Creek Brown Bear Tours, but in any individual tour you never know what will stand out as the most memorable. On this tour, which was my 10th to this destination, the photographic highlight was one of the strangest. We came across a subadult female brown bear who looked like she was auditioning for the “swimsuit edition” of Sports Illustrated!
Initially, she was all curled up resting in her cozy little depression in the sand, not far from the coastal shoreline. As we approached, she became alert, sat up, but quickly realized we were not a threat and then focused on how many different positions she could contort herself into in search of that elusive most comfortable position. She spent a little time on her left side, then her right side, on her back, did a few sit-ups, scratched her chest with her claws, and finally shifted back to her belly. It was hilarious to watch and productive at generating cute, interesting images. Her posing could not have been better!
The bears at Silver Salmon Creek spend a lot of time locating, digging, and eating Pacific razor clams, especially when salmon are not available. At first, it may seem surprising that carnivores as large as brown bears would waste their time trying to eat something so small, but razor clams are surprisingly high in energy, averaging about 100 calories per clam.
It’s fun to watch bears digging clams but getting a respectable photo, where you can clearly see the clam, can be elusive. It’s a hard shot to get because the clams are so small and usually the bear’s paw blocks the view while they dexterously use their claws, and sometimes their teeth, to hold it, pry open or break the shell and remove the fleshy part. However, on this tour I was able to get that rare shot of a clam protruding from a brown bear’s lips, like watching a wine-taster holding it in their mouth until all the flavors are evaluated!
Silver Salmon Creek is a great destination for photographing brown bears. With mid-range lenses, you can usually count on getting some nice images of bears in the foreground and stunning scenery of forests and snow-covered mountains in the background; or great shots of close bears walking through a meadow of beautifully colored wildflowers like Nootka lupine, wild geranium, or fireweed. With telephotos, 400 mm and longer, you should not have any trouble getting full-frame bears, or even “head shots” These kinds of photos are the types that we usually capture almost daily at Silver Salmon Creek.
Sometimes special circumstances develop that sets the stage for more unique and interesting photo opportunities. On this tour, we had some unusually strong winds that caused larger than usual waves to develop along the Cook Inlet shoreline. Spotting a photogenic bear moving along the coastline in our direction, we set up along the beach where we knew he would walk right in front of us. The goal was to position ourselves at a low angle (on our knees) so that with longer telephotos, we could compress the scene and magnify the relative size of the waves which would be in the background of the bear as it passed. A few minutes later, as the bear walked in front of us, our planning paid off and we were able to capture some dramatic photos of a good-looking brown bear walking in the foreground and moody “rough seas” as the background. I can’t speak for everyone, but for me, it always feels more rewarding when foresight and planning goes into “making” a photo instead of just “taking” a photo.
One unplanned but memorable photographic episode on this trip occurred when we parked our 4-wheeler and carts along the side of a dirt road and began photographing a nearby bear. Soon another bear appeared and chased “our” bear right past us. Both bears ran at top speed within 10 yards of us, past our 4-wheeler and carts, and very close to another 4-wheeler with 3 people on it. It was dramatic action to photograph, and an exciting life experience. In most places in America that would make the news, but at Silver Salmon Creek, it was just another typical day!
During our brown bear tour, the folks from Silver Salmon Creek offered an “add on” opportunity for a half-hour boat ride to Duck Island to photograph horned and tufted puffins. Almost all of us chose to take the brief midday break from bear photography, add some diversity to our photo collection, and to try our luck with puffins. From the boat we did some photography of puffins flying by and swimming on the surface of the water. Then we were dropped off on the island for about an hour where we photographed puffins at their nesting sites, perched on colorful lichen-covered rocks, and having great opportunities with puffins flying right near us. The puffin excursion was quite an adventure where we learned that photographing flying puffins is a challenging exercise but tons of fun!
Surprisingly, we had plenty of opportunities to photograph bear mating behavior on our July tour. Typically, at this location in Alaska, most breeding is over by late June and adult males are no longer following females. However, that was not the case this year. We saw males following, and in some cases attempting to breed, females throughout this tour.
Unlike most mammals, bears have stimulated ovulation. What that means is that females need to copulate extensively to stimulate their reproductive tract to ovulate, making eggs available for fertilization. When females are in heat, it is common to see a male, or multiple different males, mating with the same female during the breeding season for more than 20 minutes at a time, and many times per day. On one occasion, while conducting research on black bears in Pennsylvania, I watched one of my radio-collared female bears mate with 3 different males over a period of just 90 minutes! Not surprisingly, considering this breeding behavior, recent paternity studies of bears have shown that different cubs in the same litter often have different fathers. These results have invalidated the old myth that only the largest and most dominant adult male in an area will monopolize genetic contributions to future generations.
In concluding, I just want to say that I believe Silver Salmon Creek is one of the best and most enjoyable places to photograph brown bears. It isn’t crowded or highly regulated, like many other bear photography sites. The comfort, food quality and hospitality while staying at our cozy is amazing. I’ve led 10 trips to this destination, each one unique and photographically productive, but I have thoroughly enjoyed each one of them and always look forward to the next one. If this sounds like something you would enjoy, please join me on my next Silver Salmon Creek brown bear tour on August 3 – 9, 2025. I hope to see you there!
