Travel Day... Getting Fired up!!!

Travel day. Today I picked up the group that is joining us for this trip. We are short two guests who sadly were locked up by their country from Israel. They were not allowed to travel here to Baja, which is heartbreaking; they were just a week away from this trip happening when their government decided it was not safe to travel. I am so sorry, guys.

This morning I left Cabo with our buddy Al who is joining us on this trip. We Ubered it to the airport to pick up our rental van. After that, we went to the airport to pick up the rest of our group joining us. In total, four guests are joining us this week. All of them eager to get out on the water and look for orcas and anything else the Ocean wishes to gift us with.

The boys. Al (wearing his Game Face), Jay, Garin and Richard.

We drove to our hotel, checked in then went down to a small restaurant to eat a quick dinner and get to know each other better. Everyone joining us had traveled with me before, so I knew them, but they did not know each other. It was fun small talk and easy to see that this group of sketchy guys (inside joke), we're going get along, and it was going to be a fun week. Reports of orcas this week have been good, so I am very optimistic about our chances for a good week. We will see, tomorrow is our first day on the water, and I am super eager to get out there and start looking.

Insane!!!

Today the reports were that the orcas spent the day in Cabo Pulmo, and the video clip I saw was insane. They captured a video of the orca breaching extremely high… talk about EPIC!

After we returned from dinner, I grabbed my topside camera and decided to see what the local bird activity was like. The place we are staying at is a small seaside town, and there seems to be a lot of birds here, so it looks like it could be fun.

After a few minutes, I encountered a cat walking across the street. Normally domestic cats do not catch my attention, nor do I ever take pictures of them. However the tail and the markings on this cat captivated me. The bob tail and the color patterns on this cat made me wonder if maybe this cats momma might have danced with a wildcat, more specifically a bobcat? I snapped a few images of it, and after studying the images it left me thinking it is part wildcat. The cats eyes are captivating, and it has tiny tuffs on its ears… so who knows? It is an amazing looking cat though.

bad image of the hummingbird. But what a beauty.

I found a beautiful hummingbird feeding on some flowers. It was a species I had never seen before called the Xantus's hummingbird. It hung out for a little while, but then it flew off. I got a crappy image of it, but now… I really want to capture a nice shot of it, so I will be using any spare time to find it.

I also managed to find a couple of dead palm trees with some nesting woodpeckers and starlings in them. I focused my time there trying to capture some behavior images, which I am pretty happy with. I will try for more later, if I have time.

Overall it was a great day. Now we are all retired to our rooms to prep gear and get a good night's sleep… the adventure officially kicks off in the morning… FINALLY!

Starling momma feeding her chick.

Thank you for reading and I hope to see you out in the world… somewhere… anywhere!

Shy Sharks out on the Ocean!

The Dude! Jacobo of Cabo Shark Dive.

Day One of my Baja trip - We went out this morning to look for smooth hammerheads. I joined a morning trip organized by my buddy Jacobo, owner of Cabo Shark Dives. The morning was beautiful, the sun was out, with no wind, and the ocean was deceivingly calm. Of course, the boat is moored in the bay of Cabo San Lucas, and the waters here are always nice and calm.

As soon as we left the bay's protection, the swells in the Pacific started building, and the winds picked up. It was going to be a rough day out at sea.

We motored out about 7 miles, and the chumming began. Not even 10 minutes into chumming, a silky shark showed up and took a bite out of our hang bait. Sadly the excitement was short-lived because the silky did not stay very long.

We continued chumming; everyone's hopes were high.

Two hours later, we had another visitor to our chum box. This time it was a smooth hammerhead, but sadly, like the silky, the hammer did not stick around long enough for us to get in the water. It left just as fast as it arrived. The chumming continued for another hour, and we had two silky sharks show up, but again, they did not stay.

Watching water… chumming and waiting for sharks to show up.

It is so difficult to figure out why some sharks stay and others leave. Sharks all have their own personalities - Some are bold, some are curious, and like the four sharks that visited us today, some are shy.

Sadly we had to leave early as Jacobo had a group he was taking out in the afternoon. The wind and the swells kept building, and the ride home was a bit of an ass-kicking, so I opted to stay in instead of going out with him for the second session.

Although we did not get skunked, we did not have the morning we all hoped to have. But that is nature and the ocean, and you never know what you are going to get. That is why I always plan our pelagic shark trips with more than one day because these sharks are so difficult to find sometimes. You need more than one day for a shot at seeing them. But despite the lack of shark encounters and no cool pics to share, I had a lot of fun hanging out on the ocean with the Cabo Shark crew and my buddy Al who out there with us.

Plus any day you get to spend out in nature is ALWAYS a great day.

So the plan now is to pack up my gear, grab some dinner and get ready to meet the group joining us for the orca trip tomorrow morning.

Thank you for reading and I hope to see you out in the world… somewhere… anywhere!

A New Adventure Begins... Baja!

I am sitting at the airport in Reynosa, Mexico waiting for my plane to pick me up and take me to Baja for our orca and Mobula ray expedition. Super fired up about getting there already. Baja is a fantastic place, and this time of year, the ocean is thick with wildlife. These are exploratory trips because you never know what you will find. Like our pelagic trips in November off Baja, every day is different.

the adventure begins…

the orca pod we encountered.

On this trip, the goal is to find orcas, but we will also be stopping to check out any other wildlife we may find, including the tens of thousands of Mobula rays out there right now. So the potential for great encounters is there and could be epic when we see the large groups of these beauties.

Plus, this is also prime-time smooth hammerhead season off Baja, and they are probably here because of the mobulas as well. I flew out a day early to join up with one of the local shark operators to spend a morning looking for these guys. Pelagic sharks are always fun. They are hard work to chum in, but when they finally do arrive, they are so much fun.

smooth hammerhead

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mating mobula rays

We ran our first trip off Baja for orcas back in 2019, and thankfully it was a success. We found them on day one and had some fantastic encounters with them. We also spent some time with mating Mobula rays which were unique and beautiful to experience. So our first trip was a truly memorable experience, which got us fired up about running another one. Sadly due to the corona crisis, we had to cancel our 2020 trip.

Despite a few hiccups along the way, we are all set to run the trip this season, and now we are just a plane ride away from it all beginning!

THE CORONA CHRONICLES BEGINS…
The goal is to share as much as I can with you guys daily—Internet permitting, of course. I should have wifi at our hotel where we will be staying to share updates nightly (when possible) with you guys. I will try not to bore you with too much writing. I am just trying to find an interesting way to share our world with you all, along with the highs and lows of the travel life in this post covid world. I tried it with videos years ago, but it was challenging to record/edit and then post, especially with sketchy wifi, so I gave up the ghost.

Anyway, they are now boarding the plane, so I got to go. But super fired up about this trip - well, two trips, we are running this one for two weeks, back-to-back, and I am excited about sharing it all with you guys.

Tomorrow morning I head out to look for smooth hammerheads… so look for a report late Tomorrow night.

big orca male we encountered in 2019.

Thank you for reading and I hope to see you out in the world… somewhere… anywhere!

New Photo Gallery is Up - Birds of Color!

I created a new photo gallery for our website dedicated to the beautiful birds of South Texas. Some are migratory birds and others are year round residents. Sadly many of our wild places are disappearing and with them will go many of our migrant species that stop through here during migration season.

I truly hope we can preserve what is left of our wild places for nature and for the world to enjoy. This album is a work in progress, I still have a lot of birds to add to the album, but I really wanted to create a portfolio to showcase these amazing animals in all their feathered glory... I truly hope you enjoy.

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The World Needs Your Fingerprint!

Do you have a story to tell? I am talking about an in-your-face, heart-pounding, hair-raising, exciting adventure story, or maybe it’s about a beautiful day spent at your local hike and bike trail. Hopefully, it's about your experiences with wildlife, but it could be another outdoor activity; tubing down the river, mountain biking, or a walk through the woods, just anything adventurous in nature. If you don't have a story like that, then you need to go out and live one.

Everyone should experience an outdoor adventure that will make you nervous, and excited, and happy, all at the same time. So move out of that comfort zone and attempt something fun and new, at least once a year.

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The next thing you need to do is document it (if you're not already). You need to write it up! DO NOT allow a great adventure to die, left buried in your memories. Not when you can pass it along.

Why... you ask?

People out there need your stories; they need your adventures; Your highs, your lows. Your experiences may inspire someone to get up and go live out their own dreams, especially in these crazy-Covid times. People need to remember that the world is still an amazing place. Plus, nature and the local communities around them need eco-tourism. Without it, it isn't easy to protect the animals and wild places we love so much.

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Maybe you're thinking to yourself, "I wish I could, but I'm not a writer." I say the second you pick up that pencil and scribble out your first lines; YOU ARE A WRITER! It does not matter if your first writing attempt is good or bad, "you are a writer." With practice, you could one day be a great one. So break out that notepad or your laptop and start writing. Just write from your heart, and you can't go wrong. And if you would like someone to read it, send it to me. I'd love to experience your story.

Remember, the world is full of people who have stories to tell. The problem is, most people don't have anything interesting to write about… you do or you will.

Thank you for reading and I will see you out in the world - somewhere… anywhere.

New Crocodile Video up on Youtube.

I edited a video from our 2020 Crocodile Diving Expedition. I wanted to create something a little different and share a more poetic look at these ancient creatures. Crocodiles are so misunderstood, yes you need to respect them, because they can be dangerous. However if you follow the rules they can be very safe to dive with. Hope you enjoy this video…

My Ride or Die!

Hey guys, this blog is a bit more personal than my other blogs, but I wanted to share a piece of my soul here. 

I was going through old hard drives, looking at images. I am making plans for a future trip. It is so much fun visiting those long lost memories, I can’t help but smile. What an incredible ride this has been, with so many magical moments that I have experienced through the years - It has been one hell of a journey.

During my search, one thing stopped me in my tracks. I was looking through images, and there was one person who has been there with me - and for me, through it all… my beautiful wife Maritza. 

This amazing lady has been my ride or die for going on 27 years, and I have to say it has NOT been easy at all. I honestly do not know how she has done it for so long… I admit that I am a horrible person to be married to. I have an addictive personality and can be extremely obsessive about whatever I am passionate about; from my bull riding days to my wildlife obsession. I am so driven that I am challenging to deal with. What’s worse than me having a passion or hobby is when I didn’t have anything moving me forward, those were horrible days for my family and me, especially my beautiful wife. 

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SO this blog is a public apology for the massive headaches I have given her through the years (and an advance for the future headaches as well, lol). I truly am sorry for my wild heart - AND a huge THANK YOU to this super human that I share my life with. Thank you for putting up with me. Thank you for helping me build this amazing world we have created together. Thank you for joining me on countless adventures. Thank you for all the great memories we have shared together. Thank you for the amazing souls we have raised up, and thank you for loving me through it all. It has been an amazing bumpy ride.

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I am excited for the future and all the ups and downs that life throws at us. Love you with fire!

I hit the Middle... 50!

Well, it is official; I am 50 years old. Yesterday was my birthday, and I hit the middle of life. What a blurry wild ride it has been so far. When I look back at my life, it has been an amazing adventure and a lot of fun. I have stumbled and have fallen (a lot!), through the years, and there are so many things I wish I could do-over. But sadly, I cannot. I hear so many people say, I have no regrets and that they wouldn’t change a thing, but I would. I would probably not be the same person if I did, but I would still do so many things differently and much better. But I am here, unable to change a thing about who I was or what I have done in my previous 50 years on earth, so I live with it, I keep charging forward, fixing what I can, having fun and seeing as much of the world as possible along the way!

I will say this; I am not going to waste any of my next 50. I will become the person I aspire to be, and make right my wrongs and live a much richer life. I am super excited about the future of my life and my companies life - especially this crazy wildlife world we have created here at SDM, from the projects we get to work on to the people we share these amazing adventures with. I am on fire about it all, and no words can truly express how I feel inside with all the unknowns that are headed our way.

Anyway, I kicked off my birthday the proper way - with a 5 am wake-up and an hour and a half drive down to South Padre Island, Texas, to snap some pictures of the spring bird migration. We had some weather blow in over the past week, creating a fallout for birds, which is an excellent time for birding.

I grabbed the Wikipedia definition of bird fallout to explain it for my non-birding buddies out there.

“Bird fallout or migration fallout results from severe weather preventing migratory birds from reaching their destination. This can occur while birds are traveling south or returning to their breeding grounds. Due to the distance traveled, birds will not have enough energy to continue flight when encountering high winds. This exhaustion results in many birds resting in one area. This may be very stressful on the birds and on the surrounding ecology. Bird fallout is not particularly common, as it stems from the chance event of severe winds found in inclement weather. Due to the rare occurrence of a migratory fallout, as well as the abundance of birds resting in a single location, it is a sought-after event for Birders.”

So I decided to visit SPI, which is one of the refuges birds use during a fallout. There are a couple of migratory visitors that I have wanted better images of, and after looking at the FB birding page for our area, I knew they were around. The painted bunting and the indigo bunting are two extremely beautiful songbirds that visit our area in the springtime, and I did not have great images of them, so I decided to stop in and see if I could finally capture a few that I could get excited about.

 Due to the fallout, there was plenty of both species hanging around, and I captured my fill of these species. The indigo bunting was still a bit of a challenge to get close to it. But I now have better images of the bird. Of course, they are not perfect… yet! So I will go back for more opportunities to get that dream shot I am after. I am sharing a few of the images I captured with you guys and once I return to SPI next week I will share some more.

What I am really after is creating a Birds of Color portfolio and a photo gallery for our website. We have so many beautiful colorful songbirds here in South Texas, and Spring is when they are all looking their best, with that amazing breeding plumage. So I am working towards snapping as many of them as possible. I already have a few, but always looking to improve it.

Until then, thanks for reading, my friends.

A Dream Comes True!

It has been a while since I have blogged… Sorry, I have been quiet. I have been on a film shoot this week. I can't say much about this project, other than I am in Texas, and it is my first blue-chip film, which I am over the moon about. Through the years, the TV projects I have been involved in have all been host-driven or reality-based wildlife films. This one is my first full-on David Attenborough style show. Where wildlife is doing what wildlife does with a narrator. This is a big deal for me since I have been working towards this for a long time.

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Female nilgai jumping across the road.

So here I am, with 5 AM wake-ups and long full days out in nature seeking out wildlife. I can share a few of the images I have captured of some of the animals I have seen out here, which have nothing to do with the project or what we are doing. These are all Texas natives, except for the nilgai, which is an invasive species. I keep my camera around, snapping images during the down time and when I can of any animals that pop out of the bush and surprise us during the day.

Finally, getting to work on one of these shows is everything I dreamed and expected it to be; it is hard work trying to capture animal behavior - with a camera that is properly framed and focused, with the record button on. Capturing behavior is really hard, so my hats off to all the wildlife filmmakers for the magic they have brought to the world throughout the years. For that I say thank you for the art and inspiration.

Javalina. These little guys where not afraid of me,

The weather has been a big issue this week, my beloved Texas sun can be draining, and the wind has been harsh, and all of us despise the deer ticks we sometimes pick up from the tall grass… except for Christian, he doesn't seem to care. Lol. This is all part of the wildlife filmmaker's journey, and I am on fire and super happy that I am finally getting to be a part of it. I love it all, especially being around animals all day - truly a dream come true.

(Below Images; Getting a shot of a juvenile Texas tortoise. To try and capture a perfect image, you need to get low. )

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White-tailed deer.

Don’t get me wrong, I am crazy obsessed about the trips for SDM that I lead, but this is a different kind of wildlife experience because I am never anywhere long enough to get to know the wildlife, except Tiger Beach. When we visit a place, we are there for maybe 5 or 6 days, and then we are off to the following location. All we get to do is taste an area, it is never long enough to get to know an animal, or its behaviors and habits. Working on a film like this, I am learning intimate details about animals and their behaviors. I ABSOLUTELY LOVE IT!

Female White-tailed deer.

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Male nilgai.

Anyway, I wanted to update you guys on what I am up to. If you have tried to contact me during this time, I apologize if I have been slow to respond. The shoot is almost over, and I will get back to emails and upcoming expeditions for SDM shortly. For now, I am going to enjoy every second I have out here, learning as much as I can from the animals and the amazing crew that I have the privilege to work with on this project. When I get the green light I will share more about this show and what we are up to. I also promise to get back to blogging and sharing with you guys, much sooner than later.

until the next one… thank you guys for reading.

With the crew this week. Christian Von Preysing (TV Journalist and adventurer), and Tom Fitz (6 time Emmy winning Wildlife filmmaker.). It’s been an honor working with you guys.

My First Bird Images Published in a Book!

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Returning from my evening run last night, I got a pleasant surprise. A package was waiting for me. As soon as I picked it up, I knew what it was.  I had been anticipating its arrival for a while now, and finally, it was here - A book called “Birds of Instagram, edited by David Sibley, and Chris Gatcum, published by Abrams Books, which I was honored to be a part of. David Sibley is the author and illustrator of The Sibley Guide to Birds, which is considered one of the most comprehensive North American ornithological field identification guides. And yes, I am a bird nerd, so it's pretty damn cool to be in a book he is part of. His guide book is one of the very first that I purchased when I first got into birding. 

These are the first bird images I have had published in a book, which is fun for me, especially since I am so passionate about birds. I remember having a conversation with a fellow photographer and ocean guy. He teasingly yet half-serious told me that I needed to stop posting bird images as it was not good for business. More importantly, it was not a good look for me since I was coming from the trenches of the shark world. I laughed it off and told him I'm in too deep. I do enjoy birding and bird photography. He just said I need to stop, and we ended the conversation. 

One of the images published in the new book.

Of course, that conversation always sat in the back of my mind, quietly nagging at me, as he is a very respected wildlife guy. But I was pretty much set on my passions, and despite being the Shark Guy, I didn't care. I genuinely enjoy it and decided to continue capturing images of birds, and posting them on our social media pages. I even have a page on IG dedicated to just my bird photography.

Fast forward to last night and leafing through the new book, I wore a huge smile on my face as I looked at my images printed on those pages. It really makes me proud of this accomplishment on my wildlife journey, and even prouder to officially call myself a published Bird Nerd. 

Thank you for reading!