the food chain.
In every walk with nature one receives far more than he seeks.
John Muir
Some people can go all of their lives and never see a glimpse of these top of the apex predators.
This year I’ve been on a roll, catching my first glimpse from 20 feet away. A chance encounter on foot that fortunately ended well, no cubs to protect or kill to guard. Considering that they’ve been clocked at 30 mph it makes 20 feet feel like a hop, skip, and a jump away.
When we first saw this most perfect of natural track traps laden with grizzly prints set by a layer of frost covering the wet mud, I almost had to remind myself to breathe.
Tracks are rapidly becoming something that I find great joy in photographing. I think in part it’s the transient nature and the luck involved with encountering them at just the right moment. Capturing them, these intimate landscapes, provides a permanent record that places like this still exist.
They tell a story as you follow them ever mindful that the beast that created them has been there and still might be. Interspersed amidst the grizzly tracks were tracks from black bear, mountain lion, elk, and later on, those of my Staffords.
But soon the wind will blow and the snow will fall, erasing the signs that in the wilderness the wild is never far away.
Stay vigilant and always check your surroundings…
it's (almost always) about the water... 
A second career for you: tracking in the African bush. It was always a thrill to figure out the stories written by the bush inhabitants as we walked through as exposed and vulnerable humans. It makes you feel 100% alive and alert, as your evocative image reminds me.