Since retiring, Bob Gress has been photographing wildlife all over the world
Bob Gress retired after about 33 years as a professional naturalist for Wichita, spending much of the time as the Great Plains Nature Center’s director. So, what’s he been doing since he retired in 2012?
“I guess I’m still a naturalist. I was a naturalist before I got that job and still am after I left that job,” said Gress. “Now it seems I just get to go to more really neat places.”
Gress, an renowned wildlife photographer, has been to Tanzania, Australia, Peru, Ecuador and the Galapagos Islands, to name a few destinations. Along the way he’s shared much of what he’s found with other people, and shot wildlife photography good enough to be displayed at the Smithsonian Institute.
Gress, 64, was raised in rural Marshall County. Like most of that location and generation he grew up fishing and hunting. In the past he’s repeatedly said one reason he got into photography is because it extended his hunting season beyond when he could be afield with a rifle or shotgun.
A few years prior to retirement he partnered with two noted nature photographers with Kansas ties to start Birds in Focus, an online collection of wild bird photography where companies and media outlets can shop for, and buy, rights to around 1,900 species of wildlife. Gress has been adding steadily to the selection since retirement.
“It’s also just open to the public,” Gress said. “You can get on there and look at birds until you get sick of looking at them. We’re up to about 9,000 photos right now.”
His partners are Arkansas City native David Seibel, now living and teaching in Johnson County, and Salina native Judd Patterson who currently works for the National Park Service and lives in Florida. As well as his own world-wide travels to experience nature in exotic locations, Gress now helps others do the same. He’s an ecotourism trip director for Mondoverde Expeditions, a Colorado-based company.
“I’m primarily the group leader on the trip, the person who works between the company and the people and the guides,” he said. “I don’t know all the birds and mammals for most of the places we go, and I don’t know the natural history so we use guides who do.” Many of those trips, especially to Central and South America, have been in decidedly rural areas of third-world countries.
“Even the best accommodations usually aren’t anywhere near as good as a Motel 6 at home,” said Gress. “By and large we don’t do any of the touristy stuff. We’re there to experience nature. It’s not traveling for relaxation, it’s to see something you’ve always heard about, or discover something you didn’t know about.”
Most of his tour clients are along for the same reasons, and many are also photographers.
Most groups average 8 to 10 people and most trips are 10 to 21 days, with a couple of days at the start and end needed for travel. Gress said he’s never really felt endangered on a trip, such as from crime or political unrest, but one of his favorite spots had a lot of familiarity.
“One reason we really enjoyed Australia is because it’s like traveling in another state,” Gress said of his trip with his wife, Mary Butel. “Their sense of humor, standard of living, culture are so very, very similar to the U.S and their birds and mammals are so unique and sometimes spectacular. Australian wildlife had been at the top of my list for a long, long time.”
The photo that won Gress a spot in the Nature’s Best International Photo Contest, which led to the placement at the Smithsonian, is a shot of a young koala on the back of another.
Other than that, Gress said it’s tough for him to pick a favorite location. On a recent tour trip to Columbia the group saw about 530 species of birds. On a trip to to a Peruvian national park Gress got the rare opportunity to get some excellent photographs of a jaguar, a big cat that’s endangered in most areas and known for being nocturnal and secretive. On the same trip he got good photos of a giant river otter, another endangered species.
The sizes and colors of the birds Gress has encountered are widely varied, as are the behaviors. Some, however, have reminded him of home.
“One day I was watching the Andean cock-of-the-rock, a spectacular bird defending a lek,” he said. “That got me to thinking they were acting like our prairie chickens back home. I marveled at the similarities of the males on a lek.”
Gress said that Kansans have nothing to be ashamed of when it comes to spectacular wildlife.
“You know, if you weren’t from around here, and you came and saw something like a cardinal, or some of our spectacular warblers you’d probably be in awe,” he said. “We see them every day, things like blue jays, and I think we take for granted just how gorgeous they are.”
But Gress has seen all of those things, and photographed most many times while he still worked in Wichita. He leaves soon for Alaska, and has a trip planned to Thailand in January.
“I’ve photographed over 1,500 species of birds, but there are more than 10,000 species out there,” he said. “I’m going to run out of time before I can get to them all, but I’m going to do all that I can.”
This story was originally published June 3, 2016 at 9:07 PM with the headline "Since retiring, Bob Gress has been photographing wildlife all over the world."