In October 2022, I was certified with Community Active Wildlife Stewards (CAWS) — a recognition program for businesses and others demonstrating wildlife stewardship, and designed to encourage responsible wildlife viewing guidelines.

• May 2024 to present: Volunteer Naturalist – Monterey Bay National Marine Sanctuary/NOAA – Public education on MBNMS and Monterey Bay/Pacific coast wildlife

• 2022 to present: Certified Active Community Wildlife Steward for Sea Otter Savvy (see above)

• 2016 to 2020:  Ethics Committee for the North American Nature Photography Association – promoting standards of ethical practice in the field of wildlife photography.

• 2014: Co-founder Wildlife Conservation Pass Project— a grassroots project to implement a new revenue pass for our National Wildlife Refuge system.

• 2009: 24-hour Hazwoper certification for oil spill response

• 2009: Wildlife rescue field response training (Wildlife Emergency Services)

• 2005 to 2010: Lindsay Wildlife Hospital volunteer

• 2004: Volunteer for Emergency Animal Rescue disaster response

• Other volunteer work: Palomacy Pigeon and Dove rescue, SF SPCA 

• I regularly donate my time and work to benefit conservation and nature advocacy organizations

My work appears in publications, exhibits, and installations, and includes cover photos for:

• Science
• U.S. Fish and Wildlife Magazine
• Colorado Review
• Functional Ecology Magazine
• Penguin Publishing’s Morning Glory Novel
• Puget Sound Partnership’s State of the Sound

Organizational + Publications including:

• Defenders of Wildlife
• Coastal California: The Wildlife (w/Jeff Corwin)
• Bay Nature
• Ocean Conservancy
• California Council for Wildlife Rehabilitators
• Elakha Alliance

[A more complete list of credits is here: Published Images]

In addition to my photography, I’m a freelance writer and an independent book researcher (15 years). My work is credited in more than 25 James Patterson/Maxine Paetro books, including Women’s Murder Club, Private, and Confessions series.

In the years prior, I wrote and edited the San Francisco travel website for About.com, worked as a freelance writer, and wrote a regular column for a national health magazine. My previous background was in administration, working in various fields including entertainment.

I love capturing the heart-stopping scenes in nature … like the moment ten thousand Snow Geese take flight at once, or the spectral breath of a bugling elk, or the pod of orcas slicing through waves on the Salish Sea.

But, I’m just as drawn to the worlds coexisting quietly alongside those charismatic species — the city pigeons, the beach hoppers and mole crabs, the pollen-dusted honeybees and dime-sized chorus frogs.

My photo collections reflect that eclecticism of spirit and, I hope, my profound appreciation for all species with whom we share this rare and spectacular planet.

My guiding principle is putting the animal’s welfare above the photo, an ethical foundation strengthened through my mentorship at a Bay Area wildlife hospital. My environmental science classes at UC Berkeley were also foundational in my conservation and wildlife work.

Ingrid Zommers

With nature at risk in so many niches — often for our own folly — there’s an urgency and obligation to care for our fellow earthlings, and to think beyond our own selves when we make choices, when we vote, and when we act. My wildlife photography has always been driven by a sense of advocacy and conservation.

My background is a cultural mix. I was born to Latvian parents, learning Latvian words before any English. My heritage is deeply connected to the the sea, the animals, and the biodiversity of the Baltics. I grew up with that ingrained, nature-oriented ethos.

I spent formative years in Europe as an expat kid, attending International Schools before repatriating to the States with my family. Two of my favorite object memories — an Instamatic camera and my mother’s Royal typewriter — led to a lifelong love for both visual and written arts.

GEAR: Olympus/OM, OM1 Mark II, OM1, 300mm f/4, 150-600mm f/5-6.7, 100-400mm f/5-6.7, 40-150mm f/2.8, 12-100mm f/4

You can read more about the inspiration behind my camera in these Q&As with International Bird Rescue and Empirical Magazine.

Enjoy your browsings and thanks for stopping by. For all uses or permissions of images posted here, please feel free to contact me for the specs.

Photos, writings, and graphics © Ingrid Valda Taylar