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End of April I went to Finland by car, via Sweden. In the area of Kuhmo, close to the border with Russia I visited Wild Brown Bear Lodge(Like in August 2008). There were still patches of snow in the forests and temperatures at night dropped easily below zero. 3 nights in a bearhide weren't very succesfull as far as bears are concerned. But to my surprise I saw a wolverine twice and one time with excellent light in the early morning. This so-called hyena of the North came to visit this place for a carcass which was laying there. These animals are extremely shy though and tend to avoid any human presency. On the picture below you can see this wolverine sneeking out of the taiga on a frosty morning.
I managed to make some nice flight pictures of these magnificent birds. There is a strange atmosphere when you wake up at 2 o'clock in the morning from the peculiar sound of displaying grouse. At first you only hear them, but from 3.30 it was possible to picture them. At the end of my stay in the Kuhmo area I've spent one night in a bearhide near Viixamo, very close to the border, in fact in no-mans land. That night I saw 3 bears. On my way to Turku, to take the ferry back to Stockholm I made an overnight stop at Patvinsuo National Park. In the evening when the rain suddenly stopped the light in the taiga was very saturated and mist was hanging on the partly frozen lakes, also hanging between the trees. Next 2 pictures were made there.
On the first picture I tried to show the 3 main colours in the taiga: brown on the upperparts of the pinetrees, from the soil up for about 2 meters greyish-green from lichen on the trees, and the green on the ground of the thick moss. More about Finland in Portfolio, in the Wild Taiga album.
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