High Desert Pronghorn Buck

by Mike Lee

Title

High Desert Pronghorn Buck

Artist

Mike Lee

Medium

Photograph - Digital Photography

Description

On this particular mid-spring morning along the edge of the Smoke Creek Desert in Lassen County California I had an experience that is very rare (for me, at least). I had a beautiful buck pronghorn, aka “speed goat,” actually stand still for me to take his photograph. Normally, as soon as I see them and try to photograph them, these skittish animals show off how they got their nickname and add to my ever-growing collection of pronghorn butt photos as they speed away from me in excess of 45mph. A huge bonus was that it was 6:30 AM and the morning sun was on the correct side of the animal so his eye threw a nice catch light and the nice light highlighted his beautiful coloration.

Pronghorns (Antilocapra americana) are amazing creatures and I feel truly blessed to live in an area where I get to see them frequently, even if they don’t like to cooperate for photos. Contrary to their aforementioned nickname, they aren’t “goats.” They also aren’t “antelope” as they are commonly called. They are the last surviving member of the Antilocapridae family which boasted at least 11 species during the Pleistocene
Epoch. They are the fastest land animal in the western hemisphere, second fastest on Planet Earth, and hands-down the fastest on the planet over any significant distance (they can do speeds in excess of 40mph for many minutes over terrain that threatens to twist my ankles just walking on it). Their profound skittishness is often in conflict with their nearly as profound curiosity. While they usually run when I get near them I have had a few give me a “stare down” when I’ve stood still at some distance and they’ve been known to absolutely fixate on shiny objects.

Uploaded

May 19th, 2023

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