While I spent a lot of 2024 staring at (and photographing) my square meter prairie plot, I did also take photos elsewhere. Here are some of my favorite 2024 photos from those other locations.

Of these four winter photos, the first three were taken on January 7 and the last one was photographed on December 13, bookending the year nicely.

By late March, I was starving for wildflower photos. It was a real pleasure to wander around Prairie Plains Resource Institute’s Gjerloff Prairie on March 30 and find some prairie false dandelion (Nothocalais cuspidata) in bloom. That was a great way to kick off the 2024 growing season.

I only photograph prairie dogs that don’t seem concerned about my presence. That’s not really so much an ethical stand as it is a reality. Prairie dogs that are concerned about my presence dive into holes when they see me. That makes photography much more challenging!

While on a quick trip to the Niobrara Valley Preserve in early April, I drove to the edge of a small prairie dog town and noticed that one of the little critters didn’t immediately zip into its burrow. I edged out of the truck and army crawled toward it, pausing for long periods to let it relax. Eventually, I captured the below photo of it chewing on some early-season plant growth.

I took another trip up to the Niobrara Valley Preserve in late May and spent a really nice couple hours watching the sun come up in our east bison pasture. The following three photos are all from that morning.

In June, I had a speaking engagement in the Nebraska panhandle and took advantage of the opportunity to visit the Conservancy’s Cherry Ranch nearby. Rather than getting a hotel, I just pitched a tent there. That gave me the opportunity to photograph some evening primroses in the evening (after sunset, technically – is that still evening?).

These flowers are named because they open late in the day and are mostly pollinated by night-flying insects. I’ve always wanted to photograph them at night. This photo was taken with my camera set on the ground and propped in the right position by a sweatshirt. It was a four second exposure, so I needed the camera to be stable.

In late July, we had a research meeting at the Niobrara Valley Preserve to discuss options for a potential project. The night before the meeting, a friend and I stood up on a ridge above the Niobrara River and watched a massive thunderstorm move across the sky to the south of us. The thunderhead was so big I had a hard time getting it all in one frame, even with my ultra wide angle lens. As it moved away, there was a lot of lightning on the back side and I scrambled to find something to put in front of it for photos. The photo below was my favorite from the batch.

When I photograph small animals, I often try to capture their face because I feel like that makes them more relatable. Since insects and spiders aren’t always the most popular with the general public, I have to work extra hard to make them seem less scary and more interesting. Photos alone don’t usually do the trick, but combining a charming portrait with a good story about how the creature lives its life can often create a feeling of connection. That’s a start.

In late July, Kim and I took a vacation excursion to the Flat Tops Wilderness in Colorado. For various reasons you can read about here, we cut the backpacking portion of our trip short and ended up camping at a nearby reservoir and doing some day trips. While it was a different trip from what we’d planned, it was still great, and I ended up with some nice photos as well. Here are a few of my favorites.

Most of my photography is done in an exploratory fashion. I don’t start out with a plan, other than to find interesting light and then look for subjects that catch my attention. Working on assignment, where I have a particular story I need to capture, is less fun for me. It also constrains me – I’d much rather be able to just find whatever happens to be the most fascinating at the time. Sometimes, that includes dangling, dew-covered grass flowers. Other times, it’s a butterfly that happens by, or a leaf with an attractive color scheme.

Every year brings new adventures. While 2025 may bring anxiety and strife, I’m confident there will also be lots of opportunities for exploration and photography. I rely on the latter to help me get through the former. I hope each of you has a similar coping mechanism – prairie-related or otherwise.

Be well, friends.

As 2024 winds down, there’s a lot to look back on. Photographically, there’s no question what my strongest memories are tied to. Starting in late April, I made 112 trips (and counting) to a 1×1 meter plot of prairie along Lincoln Creek on the eastern edge of Aurora, Nebraska. There, I found an incredible bounty of beauty and complexity that kept me spellbound – often for more than an hour at a time.

To celebrate my square meter prairie year, I’ve chosen 30 of my favorite portraits taken within that little plot of land. I hope you enjoy them, but I’m not finished with the project. There are still four more months to go before I’ve completed a full year of visits and I plan to take full advantage of that time – especially when there is snow, frost, or sky to provide a little extra accent to the story.

In the meantime, here are my favorite 30 photos (so far!) from my square meter of prairie.

If you take nothing else from this project, I hope you’ll come away with a sense of how much happens beneath the canopy of a prairie. Even in a small, isolated, restored (planted in 1980) prairie next to the local pet adoption center, there was a stupendous abundance of life, activity, and wonder to admire and photograph. Now multiply that across acres, square miles, and landscapes of grassland. Come on, now!

Grasslands are not flat, boring places full of grass. They’re full of complex, interacting species and communities that combine to form a beautiful and resilient ecosystem. Please share this post and project with anyone who still hasn’t discovered that.