Chief Little Hare

One of the benefits of living where I do is fairly east access to alpine habitat via the Beartooth Highway. Last weekend I spent a few hours along the highway at the top of the pass looking for a few animals to photograph. One of my intended subjects was the Pika (Ochotona princeps), also sometimes known as Chief Little Hare (the name that Audubon used for the species in his illustrated book The Viviparous Quadrapeds of North America). I was able to find a small group of these animals amid the rocky alpine habitats they prefer and I just sat down and watched them for quite a while. For a good portion of the time they were too close for me to photograph with the camera/lens setup I was using but I did get a few shots.