Biography-Larry Thorngren Nature Photography

The Wild Nature Photography of Larry Thorngren

ARTIST STATEMENT

I have always been interested in wild plants and animals. When I was 4, I took my 2 year old brother with me on a field trip along a canal a few blocks from home to look for tadpoles. (The big kids across the street had a tub full of them they had collected there) We forgot to tell our aunt, who was babysitting us, about our plans and when she finally found us along the canal with our collection bottles looking for tadpoles and frog eggs, she wasn’t happy. I got an awful spanking for leading the field trip and taking my 2 year old brother near the canal.

When I was 5 my parents bought a farm east of Rigby, Idaho. It wasn’t much of a farm for making a living, but it had about 25 acres of cottonwood trees and an old abandoned homestead with an orchard where I spent a lot of time looking in bird nests and catching garter snakes and frogs.

When I was about 8, Carnation Cornflakes started putting an Audubon bird Identification card in every cereal box. I became a collector of bird cards and consumed many bowls of cornflakes in order to get new ones. Before long I had dozens of bird ID cards and by the time I was 10 or 11 knew the names of most of the birds that lived on our farm and along a branch of the Snake River that flowed a short distance from the back of our farm. I looked in every bird nest I could find, and examined hundreds of eggs and baby birds to see what they looked like.

When I got old enough to own a .22, I became a hunter of wild things; first rabbits and pheasants, ducks, and then deer and elk when I was older yet. When I went to college, I minored in Biology and eventually taught high school Biology in Idaho Schools and led students on field trips for many years.

I started taking photographs of wild flowers and animals to use in sllde-shows for my Biology classes.

In 1980 I won National Wildlife Magazines’ photo contest and began to sell my photos at arts and craft show in Idaho and surrounding states.
Since then, I have sold many thousands of matted and framed photographs that hang on walls all over the U.S and several foreign countries. Today, I still sell at some shows each summer and have managed to get published in several magazines and calendars.

I enjoy observing and photographing wild animals. I would have a hard time living in a world without them.

LARRY THORNGREN

A professional nature photographer, Larry Thorngren has spent many years studying animals. One of his favorite is the North American Bighorn Sheep. He did range studies for, and helped trap, wild bighorns in Canada for transplantation into central Idaho. In the ensuing years wild sheep all over North American, and other animals, seem to find him irresitable as you'll see when you look at his photo galleries. Enthusiasts worldwide including those from North America, Europe, and Japan have purchased and collected his photos. He has been published in Italy, Australia and New Zealand in addition to various publications in the United States.

During his spare time Larry spent 21 years teaching science and photography in the Idaho school system. Many of his biology students have been inspired to go into careers in the natural sciences.

Hear Larry below

Listen to 2008 "Off The Trail" Interview

LARRY THORNGREN
13118 Tucker Rd.
Donnelly, ID 83615

208-891-3128

sales@LARRYTHORNGREN.COM

Images are available for licensing
High Resolution images. stock photos etc are available for publication
Photo Editors/Buyers welcome