A brown bear comes down mid-lunge on a salmon in the shallows at Katmai National Park, Alaska

Katmai National Park, Alaska

Pounce

Standing in the braided river at Katmai, this brown bear had settled into the rhythm of the hunt. He stood almost upright in the water, his front paws just below the surface, quietly watching for the next salmon to give him an opportunity. Then, for a brief moment, he looked directly at me.

There was something remarkably calm about the encounter. He wasn't charging or even particularly concerned with my presence; his attention was still fixed on the water around him. But that moment of eye contact changed the image, turning what could have been a straightforward photograph of a bear fishing into something much more personal.

I called the photograph Pounce because you can almost feel the anticipation in his posture. He's perfectly still, but you know that at any moment, that stillness could turn into motion.

Nikon Z 7II · Nikkor Z 180-600mm · 600mm · f/6.3 · 1/1250 sec · ISO 4500

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Frame 44 of 82

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