Family Portrait

I received this in an email and thought it was worth sharing  ~they really do look like they are posing for a family portrait! Bear Quints - once in a lifetime photo  Black bears typically have two cubs; rarely, one or three. In 2007, in northern New Hampshire , a black bear sow gave birth to five healthy young. There were two or three reports of sows with as many as 4 cubs, but five was, and is, very extraordinary. The photographer learned of them shortly after they emerged from their den and set a goal of photographing all five cubs with their mom - no matter how much time and effort was involved. He knew the trail they followed on a fairly regular basis, usually shortly before dark. After spending nearly four hours a day, seven days a week, for more than six weeks, he had that once-in-a-lifetime opportunity and photographed them. He used the equivalent of a very fast film speed on his digital camera. The print is properly focused and well exposed, with all six bears posing as if they were in a studio for a family portrait. This spring, just before the snow disappeared, all six bears came out of their den and wandered all over the same familiar territory they trekked in the spring of 2007. The photographer saw them before mid-April and dreamed nightly of taking another family portrait, a highly improbable second once-in-a-lifetime photograph. On 25 April 2008, he achieved his dream.   When something as magical as this happens between man and animal, Native Americans say, "We have walked together in the shadow of a rainbow." And so it is with humility and great pleasure that I share these exhilarating photos with you. Do pass them on!