Towheeblog

We owlers are a small coterie, and our emails fly faster than our owls.  That’s how I first found out about Steve Mattheis. I was introduced via email by another nature photographer friend.
Steve’s a Jackson, Wyoming, photographer who has just published a marvelous book about his local Great Gray Owls–in the Tetons and Yellowstone.  I have been going through my copy–wow!

There are spectacular night shots.  Images in all season from high summer to deep snow.  Adults in flight with vole in mouth.  Adult presenting vole to anticipating fledgling.  Owlets in all phases from fuzzy white to near-adult.  Female on nest. The Stare, seen in many places in many versions.  When you’ve been stared at by a Great Gray Owl you can believe the eyes look through you and into your deepest recesses…and you are thankful you are much larger than a vole or shrew.

The text will take you into the woods for wonder, excitement and even anxiety.  At one time Steve witnesses a red-tail attack a fledged owlet and then the mother attacks the red-tail which has gone to ground with the owlet.

Here is the website where you can order Steve’s book.

PHANTOM OF THE NORTH. Great Gray Owls of the Tetons and Yellowstone.
Sweetgrass Books.  Helena, MT.  2019.
Photos:  Steve Mattheis.
Text: Katherine Gura

Great job, Steve and Katherine.