Wildlife Near a Creek

I’ve gone on a little hiking trip to use up some PTO days before the end of the year, and to enjoy the milder weather of November. For this journey, I decided to head to South Texas and hit a few state parks that I have never visited, weather permitting. My first state park was to be South Llano River State Park near Junction Texas for an afternoon. I was going to stop on the way to Bracketville where I was to stay for the night. But as I pulled up to the park gate, I found that the park was closed for hunting.

So, I headed on down to Bracketville and hoped to make the best of the afternoon. I stayed at place called Fort Clark that is apparently a former army post, but the area also has some hiking trails so that is what I focused on. A short walk from the hotel are some trails through the woods near a creek and I spent what remained of the afternoon hiking these trails and seeing some wildlife.

This trail seemed to be crawling with deer from end-to-end, so I ended up with a lot of deer photos. I would hear them splashing out of the creek and up into the woods as I came along the trail. Below is an image of a few deer staring at me from across the creek.

A little later, I guess I surprised a fawn in the brush and it panicked running straight towards me. But seeing the big scary two-legged animal, it turned and darted up the trail and eventually stopped to see if I was following. It posed long enough for a few pictures, and then ran off into the woods to find its little rabbit friend.

As it got darker, I saw a raccoon come out of its hiding place in a tree and head down to the creek for drink. It seemed to watch me the entire time I was photographing it, but it didn’t seem too worried about me. It was getting dark in the woods by this time and this photo was shot at very high ISO (ISO28735) and I used the Lightroom denoise tool to clean it up. It looks a bit over-sharpened but not too bad.

The clouds continued to thicken up and it got dark. Hopefully tomorrow I would be able to get in some good hiking at Garner State Park. Thanks for reading.

21 thoughts on “Wildlife Near a Creek”

  2. Fantastic photos! I think this is the best you’ve ever submitted in one post. I love the shot of the fawn. I also love that I can see the reflection of the racoon’s face in the water. Great stuff, all of it, including the butterfly. But my favorite is the fawn.

    Also, I’m glad you didn’t get shot by any deer hunters.

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