June 2026 • Nebraskaland 85
CONTINUING THE GROUNDWORK
Fowler will be the first to share that his predecessors —
namely Jon Farrar, Ken Bouc, Rocky Hoffmann, Bob Grier
and Mike Forsberg — set the bar high at Nebraskaland and
strongly felt it was his duty to continue the caliber of their
work long after they retired from the magazine.
No one was better in the studio than Bouc, Fowler often said.
Bouc's Cellars of Time from January/February 1994 is one he
frequently references, marveling at how the staff light painted
dinosaur skeletons while still shooting with film cameras.
Still inspired to this day, Fowler continues to improve his own
studio techniques, photographing anything from American
burying beetles to detailed shots of fishing tackle.
Bouc was also his staff's de facto underwater photographer,
a skill Fowler picked up in 2009 with the purchase of a
point-and-shoot underwater housing, eventually becoming
SCUBA-certified in 2015 and adding underwater housing
dedicated to an SLR.
His first foray in camera trapping in 2014 resulted in
capturing bats in flight above a pond, but that set-up was
borrowed. He added one to his bag two years later, following
the work of Forsberg and colleague Justin Haag in hopes of
capturing photos of a mountain lion that had decided to call
Indian Cave State Park home.
His camera trap photo of a mountain lion walking across a
log at Indian Cave State Park immediately became iconic. His
painting-like depiction of this seldom-seen predator rivaled
some of the best photographs ever seen in this publication.
Today, he continues to run camera traps across the state.
He'll also lie in a blind for days and shoot photos of wildlife
for a natural history story, just like Farrar, wake up early
and chase landscapes like Grier or roll up to a campground
in the afternoon like Hoffmann to mingle — while still
photographing — with visitors.
His most recent foray is drone photography in 2023, set in
motion by the drone work being done by Haag in the Pine
Ridge and his own longtime method of shooting from an
airplane — which started through an internship at Chadron
State and continues with his often-said motto for aerial
photography: "You buy, I'll fly."
TOP: A North American paddlefish swims in the Missouri River
below Fort Randall Dam in South Dakota.
BOTTOM: Using a camera trap, Fowler captured this image of a
female mountain lion at Indian Cave State Park.
TOP: Matt and Amy Ludwig of Adams kayak at sunrise at Wagon
Train Lake State Recreation Area.
BOTTOM: Sunrise illuminates the fog in a meadow along the
Platte River in Douglas County.
