“Professional” photographer under fire for getting uncomfortably close to Yellowstone grizzly bears
Jun 19, 2024
Dunja Djudjic
Dunja Djudjic is a multi-talented artist based in Novi Sad, Serbia. With 15 years of experience as a photographer, she specializes in capturing the beauty of nature, travel, and fine art. In addition to her photography, Dunja also expresses her creativity through writing, embroidery, and jewelry making.
Share:
Yellowstone National Park’s beauty is undeniable, but so are the dangers of wildlife encounters. The Instagram page Tourons of Yellowstone frequently highlights the careless behavior of some tourists who trespass into restricted areas or get too close to wild animals. In a recent video, they showed tourists crowded along a roadside near Beryl Spring, photographing a grizzly bear and her cubs. Naturally, it sparked outrage among photographers and nature lovers alike.
We’ve seen this behavior before, and it often didn’t end well. In the video, you can see a bunch of tourists and someone who appears to be a professional photographer (at least judging from the gear).
Kaley Beausoleil, the wildlife photographer who captured the video, expressed her frustration in the caption: “I’m especially mad at the photographer. You want to be a professional? Act like one! Teach people to respect wildlife and give them space.” Beausoleil also added in the video description that in the video was a grizzly bear with her two cubs near Beryl Spring. She added, “The amount of people and their complete lack of respect made me get out of there quickly. I did not return to this location.”
Commenters overwhelmingly sided with Beausoleil. One person remarked that “just because someone has an expensive camera and lenses does not make them a professional.” Another wrote that, with a long lens like that, you shouldn’t be so close to the bears. ” This is how attacks happen. And it is NOT the bear’s fault,” another comment reads.
The dangers of getting too close to grizzlies – and how to avoid it
While grizzly bear attacks are uncommon, they can be severe and often occur due to accidental encounters or negligent behavior. Getting close to cubs is a guaranteed way to provoke a mama bear’s protective instincts.
Just last month, a hiker on Signal Mountain Trail encountered a grizzly sow after unknowingly getting too close to her cubs. Luckily, the hiker survived the encounter, but it serves as a stark reminder of the potential consequences.
How to avoid dangerous encounters? Well, it’s simple – just keep your distance. The National Park Service advises visitors to maintain a safe distance from wildlife. Park regulations mandate staying at least 25 yards away from animals like bison or elk, and a minimum distance of 50 yards from predators like bears and wolves. Another comment on Kaley’s video shares the “rule of thumb” for knowing whether or not you’re too close:
“Extend one arm out and raise your thumb. Close one eye and move the thumb to the animal in your field of vision. If the thumb doesn’t obscure the animal, you’re too close. (It’s the only “rule of thumb” that actually is a rule of thumb.)”
[via Wide Open Spaces]
Dunja Djudjic
Dunja Djudjic is a multi-talented artist based in Novi Sad, Serbia. With 15 years of experience as a photographer, she specializes in capturing the beauty of nature, travel, and fine art. In addition to her photography, Dunja also expresses her creativity through writing, embroidery, and jewelry making.
Related Posts
Watch: Yellowstone photographer refuses to move for grizzly bear and her cubs
72-year-old woman gored by bison at Yellowstone after getting too close while shooting photos
Tourist walks right up to a grizzly bear for some close-up shots
Photographer captures polar bears up close in an abandoned weather station
Join the Discussion
DIYP Comment Policy
Be nice, be on-topic, no personal information or flames.
3 responses to ““Professional” photographer under fire for getting uncomfortably close to Yellowstone grizzly bears”
The distance is 100 yds from bears and wolves in Yellowstone….
With all due respect to the article’s author, Ms. Djudjic and particularly, Ms. Beausoleil, having a long Canon lens on a camera doesn’t mean a person is a professional photographer. There are huge numbers of amateur photographers with professional quality gear shooting wildlife and other subjects these days. In my travels throughout the U.S. as a professional photographer, photographing wildlife and while leading wildlife photowalks as a U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service volunteer I see them all the time. I had a group of eleven amateur photographers just last weekend and while most had prosumer Canon, Sony and Nikon cameras with mid-length telephotos, three had professional level mirrorless or DSLR cameras with 500mm and 600mm lenses.
There was no need to bring up the “professional” in both the Instagram post and the above article so strongly considering that whether or not the person is a professional was unknown, in order to make the point that the behavior of everyone there was stupid and boneheaded, especially considering that the Grizzlies included a parent with its cubs. Moreover, standing there was unethical since being that close, again especially because of the cubs, was putting the Grizzlies at stress.
Moreover, in the article itself, Ms. Djudjic states, “Park regulations mandate staying at least 25 yards away from animals like bison or elk, and a minimum distance of 50 yards from predators like bears and wolves.” While I’m happy that Ms. Djudjic found time to include distances that park goers should be away from the animals, her statement is incorrect.
On the Yellowstone Safety page ( https://www.nps.gov/yell/planyourvisit/safety.htm ) within their website it states, “The animals in Yellowstone are wild and unpredictable, no matter how calm they appear to be. The safest (and often best) view of wildlife is from inside a car. Always stay at least 100 yards (91 m) away from bears and wolves, and at least 25 yards (23 m) away from all other animals, including bison and elk.” Further down the page in the Wildlife section, under Bears, it’s more declarative, stating, “Give bears space. Keep at least 100 yards (93 meters) from bears at all times and never approach a bear to take a photo.”
If Ms. Djudjic is going to give information to help protect her readers, then she needs to get the information right. Being only 50 yards from bears and wolves, particularly if they are caring for their young is far too close to be safe and it will put the animals under stress which is to be avoided.
Powerful reminder, Dunja. Over 20 years, my late wife and I probably spent a couple of weeks in Yellowstone, a favorite park and, being Golden Agers, free to us. I went to the link, stopped the video to get the best view of that massive lens I could, and concluded that it is a Canon RF200-800mm f/6.3-9 IS USM, priced to buy under $2000 USD, and rentable, of course.
600mm is the gold standard for wildlife primes, so here is a zoom with an 800mm reach. Our “pro” could have been a hundred yards or meters distant and gotten incredible closeups. Kaley Beausoleil, an actual working professional, knew that, so she called foul on the pretentious idiot.
Like almost all commenters, I don’t think this guy is a real pro; he just likes to try to look like one. The group looks to be no more than 30 feet (~10 meters) from the bears. At 800mm at that range, he could have made tight closeups of Mama Bear’s eyelashes, but they might not be wire-sharp since he is handholding a ~4.5 pound (2,050 g) lens. The very high magnification also magnifies the slightest motion; your heartbeat can be enough to smear the shot unless you crank your shutter and your ISO to compensate.
There’s a reason we are calling them “tourons.”