April, 2024

Wildlife in Finland – what an experience!

The first time for me to photograph wildlife from a hide and it certainly won´t be the last time.

I joined a guided photogroup again. We met up at the airport in Helsinki and continued together on the flight to Kuopio. From there it was another 3 hours drive northeast to Kuhmo and beyond. We stayed at Lassi Rautiainens Base Camp Kuikka close to the Russian border.

I was hoping to photograph brown bears, wolves and wolverines – and yes we saw all of them!
We chose april for our trip because we wanted to see the animals in snow and we hade a lot of it!

The brown bears came regularely to the hide called “paradise”. One morning we were lucky to see 3 wolves there as well.
The wolverine was the most difficult to find, but on our last evening one showed up for just a minut or so in the hide “pineforrest”.

One day we changed location to photograph black grouse. That was quite special, too. Besides the black grouse there were many cute snow buntings as well.

Even though we slept in the hide and it was early mornings and late nights it was a really relaxing week. Almost felt like diving into another world.

Hope you enjoy the photos.