100 days in a 100-year-old park

First there was the snow dumping on photographer Chris Peterson as he tramped over to the east side of Glacier National Park to photograph St. Mary on May 1, 2009.

Then there was the black bear sow up a tree around eye level — she had shooed her cub up higher — doing all the threatening bear things and clacking her teeth at him across a big gully.

“She was seriously unhappy to see me,” Peterson said.

And the wolves up the Inside North Fork Road, two of them in trees and dense underbrush, one barking at him from maybe 50 yards away.

“That was by far the coolest day of the trip,” the Hungry Horse News photographer and Glacier Park Magazine editor said.

The wildlife encounters all were part of Peterson’s “100 Straight Days in Glacier, A Photographic Journey,” intended to mark the park’s 100 years by spending 100 consecutive days witnessing its wildlife, mountains and moods, using a mix of film and digital cameras that would have been used over the course of the century.

Peterson’s 100-day marathon really wouldn’t have been complete without the hoary marmot nearly climbing on his back to get a better look at him on his last day out. Peterson photographed the rodent’s big nose and serious incisors on Aug. 9.

On Friday, Peterson will display all 100 photos, plus some extras, at a Glacier Park Centennial event in Columbia Falls. The evening is being organized and sponsored by First Best Place Task Force.

The show runs from 6 to 8 p.m. in Glacier Discovery Square on Nucleus Avenue. Admission is free, appetizers are complimentary, the wine and beer bar has a suggested donation.

Nuevo Columbia, fronted by Shyamali of “American Idol” fame, will provide a collection of music from gypsy jazz to Latin to traditional vocal favorites.

Peterson’s photos, enlarged in various sizes and ready to frame, will be strung clothesline-style throughout the center. They can be purchased that night or prints can be ordered for later delivery. Proceeds go to First Best Place for continuing renovation at the center.

Copies of the special collector’s edition of Glacier Park Magazine, containing Peterson’s photos and his daily log, will be for sale that night.

Peterson hiked more than 500 miles across swamps and high-country passes, emphasizing wilderness and lugging a heavy 400-millimeter camera lens every day but one.

“You never really give up on a day, and there were so many days when things happened in the last five or 10 minutes,” he said.

Despite near encounters of both black and grizzly bears, a face-off with wolves and a bull moose that barely skirted his lakeside tent to take an early morning swim, Peterson said he never was scared. His focus was on photographing the critters.

“The picture I didn’t get was the wolverine that walked literally right up to me,” maybe 15 feet away on a trail, he said. He had been looking the opposite direction, but by the time the two of them made eye contact and Peterson swung his camera into action, the wolverine had scurried away and dived into the trail-side brush.

What he’s perhaps most pleased with is that he photographed four species of owls, “which is really unheard of,” he said. He spotted a barred owl in the cedars off Avalanche trail when it was nearly dark, but a great gray, great horned and northern hawk owl showed up in broad daylight.

The key to his success is not that he sees things better than anyone else, he said.

“I think it’s just that I’m more patient,” he said.

“You almost always wait for the photo to come to you. If you go to it, you’re going to fail,” he said. “Once you get into a zone that you can actually take a picture, whatever it’s going to be, it usually sets itself up. The bottom line is, you can’t really force things. You can’t force things in Glacier.”

For a sneak peek, visit www.glacierparkmagazine.com and click on “100 Straight Days in Glacier, A Photographic Journey”

Reporter Nancy Kimball may be reached at 758-4483 or by e-mail at nkimball@dailyinterlake.com