July 19, 2014
Yellow-Bellied Marmot in its Alpine Environment, San Juan National Forest, Colorado

I always like to photograph a subject differently when possible. I usually photograph Yellow-Bellied Marmots or Yellowbelly Marmots (Marmota flaviventris) with a long lens, like a 500mm or 600mm and probably with a 1.4x tele-extender attached, because it keeps me far enough away from the subject so they're relaxed and can go about their business. I had been using such a set up to photograph the group of young marmots near their rock burrow for the past few days, and noticed that sometimes a couple of them sat on another group of rocks surrounded by flowers. So yesterday afternoon, I first set up to photograph them there. They weren't too cooperative, so I started to make my way around to where I had been setting up to photograph them at the rock burrow. That's when I saw an adult marmot working its way towards my Jeep and I knew it would go through a nice patch of Alpine Avens or Ross's Avens (Acomastylis rossii turbinata) to get there. I also knew that it was interested in my Jeep because on the previous days I had seen one and sometimes two adult marmots climbing around my Jeep looking for something tasty to chew on like wires or hoses. I got into position to photograph the adult, and it kept on coming towards the Jeep and the 600mm was way too much lens. It also didn't mind me shooing it away from the Jeep and at one point I had a hard time getting it out from under the Jeep. Because the marmot was so tolerant, I switched to a fairly wide-angle lens for wildlife, a 45mm Tilt/Shift lens. Because the marmot was so intent on getting to my Jeep and also quite tolerant of me, I was able to corral it into a nice setting for a fantastic grand landscape image.