Courtenay’s own Stephen Williamson was recently recognized in the BC SPCA’s annual Wildlife-In-Focus Wildlife Photography Contest.
Winning first place in the Wild Settings category, Williamson’s image of grizzly bear running in the Glendale River was a favourite across the independent panel of judges.
The first-place photo will be featured in an future issue of AnimalSense, the BC SPCA’s magazine that reaches 60,000 supporters. Williamson will also receive a tripod from Broadway Cameras.
This fourth annual contest allows backyard and amateur photographers to showcase their encounters with amazing wild animals from every part of the province.
The event is also a fundraiser for the society’s Wild Animal Rehabilitation Centre (Wild ARC — wildarc.com) on southern Vancouver Island. Wild ARC cares for more than 2,000 orphaned and injured wild animals a year — this year the centre has already treated 2,338 animals.
The annual contest, which runs from June to September annually, encourages participants to explore greenspaces, roadsides, beaches and even backyards to find striking images that represent the resiliency of local wildlife living at the interface with humans. “Wildlife” includes free-living birds, mammals, amphibians, reptiles, fish and insects, but not exotic, feral or domestic animals, or wildlife in zoos or rehabilitation facilities.
See all the winners from this year's contest and past years online at spca.bc.ca/wildlife-in-focus.
— BC SPCA