The Work of Nature Photographer Gary Hattis Featured in Calendar

Gary Hattis of Portland has been a professional photographer for most of his adult life. What began as a hobby became a profession for him. Gary ran a successful portrait studio in Portland for many years before retiring in 2015. Since that time he has been pursuing his number one passion of photographing nature.

“I’ve traveled all over the United States doing nature photography,” said Gary. “But my favorite place to do photography remains as Michigan, including Ionia County.”

Gary’s photography has recently been featured in a calendar produced by the Rocky Mountain Raptor Program. The RMRP is centered in Ft. Collins, Colorado, where Gary has family including his brother David. The RMRP is featuring two of Gary’s photos in their 2026 calendar, which is being produced for the purpose of fund-raising.

“One of the images that I’m furnishing to the RMRP for use in their calendar is that of a bald eagle that I took just north of Lyons, Michigan,” said Gary. “I used a long telephoto to capture the image of the raptor.  The photos were taken the day following a local ice storm, and the branches of the tree in which the eagle was sitting were covered with ice. It made for a striking photograph.”

Gary said that when he was a young person there were very few bald eagles in Michigan, due to a pesticide which decimated their numbers.

“Bald eagles have made a tremendous comeback,” said Gary. “There are now many eagles in Michigan, including some right here in Ionia County.”

The second image that is being used in the calendar is that of a stunning female snowy owl perched on top of a fence post.

“I follow an internet site called “e-Bird” that is sponsored by the Audobon Society,” said Gary. “The site reports sightings of rare birds for the benefit of bird enthusiasts and of nature photographers. One day it reported sightings of snowy owls roosting near Portland Road just west of Morrison Lake. I immediately grabbed my camera and I drove there to see what I could find. I cruised the area slowly for a while until by chance a saw a female bird perched atop a fence post. I got some great shots of her with a telephoto. Snowy owls are magnificent birds that winter in Michigan. The Rocky Mountain Raptor Program was happy to use the image in their calendar.”

The Rocky Mountain Raptor Program is a non-profit organization devoted to rescuing wounded and sick birds that people find and bring to the RMRP’s center. There the birds are rehabilitated by volunteers and are eventually reintroduced to the wild. Unfortunately some of the birds cannot be saved. These bird are humanely euthanized. The feathers of euthanized eagles are given to Native American groups who use the feathers in their sacred ceremonies.

“In this manner the eagles are repurposed,” said Gary. “In a way, they are given a second life as sacred symbols to the Native Americans.”

Gary has spent many years in photography and he says that he feels blessed to have been able to pursue his career in Portland.

“I feel particularly blessed to be able to have done this in our community,” he said. “I was fortunate and blessed to work with local groups like the Boy Scouts and the Portland Historical Society. These groups had a tremendous influence on me and they helped to form me as an individual. The community itself was instrumental in guiding me into my profession. Portland is a great place in which to have grown up and it proved to be a great place to practice my profession. I wouldn’t want to be anywhere else on the globe and I have seen many, many beautiful places.”

Photos by Gary Hattis