I took a 2 hour hike at Country Lane Woods on Thanksgiving morning and was very thankful I did (get it, get it), because the wildlife was out in droves! I’m not sure why. Was it because the woods were empty of humans? Did the wildlife feel secure to venture out? Maybe.

Here is part of the trail. It was cloudy and windy. The strong wind made it feel colder than the actual temperature of 41°F. I had to bundle up. When I arrived I immediately heard sandhill cranes flying above. Not only one wave of cranes but wave after wave of sandhill cranes! They were so loud! Some flew in a V formation and some were moving about in their group repositioning themselves.

Next, I found a flock of cedar wax wings eating berries. Tons of wax wings all around flew from branch to branch, even hanging upside down to get at the hard to reach berries. With this group I also saw several blue jays and chickadees.

Further down the road I spotted two red-bellied woodpeckers. My photo isn’t the greatest, but he has a zebra-pattern black and white back. Why is this woodpecker names red-bellied? Well, on his belly there is a light patch of red. We cannot see it. I’m guessing this is a male because the female has a much smaller patch of red on her head.

Just a few feet away I caught a glimpse of the red-headed woodpecker. I know this picture is bad, but you can see his black body, the large white section of featherson his wing, and just barely a whole red head. In fact, my “Birds of Illinois” book by Stan Tekiela states that this is the only woodpecker in Illinois that has an entirely red head. It also states that this is a summer bird in my area, but clearly it is not summer.

Birds were not the only stars of the show at Country Lane Woods, I came across two white tail deer as well. They didn’t let me get too close however, true to their name, those white tails shot up and they quickly darted away.

I also found the most interesting piece of lichen on a small branch. I think I will save that prize for next time when we can learn more about it and make a little sketch.

I was very thankful to see so many different kinds of wildlife, I almost felt like Snow White!

Early Morning Oak

It’s possible that an observant reader might have noticed that I like to steal my post titles* from songs or novels or ..well wherever inspiration strikes. This one comes from a Jeeves and Wooster novel. I haven’t read it recently, but the first chapter from it was appended to the end of ‘Summer Lightning’ which I borrowed from Lancaster library as a stand in for ‘Uncle Fred in the Springtime’ which I need to read for out book group, but they didn’t have. ‘Summer Lightning’ was excellent – pure escapism, with a high chuckle count. I’m wondering now whether I still need to find ‘Uncle Fred in the Springtime’ for our book group, since reading any Wodehouse novel is much the same as reading any other. You expect high farce and the usual selection of stock characters – but it’s the fabulous dialogue and Wodehouse’s turn of phrase which keep me coming back for more.

So – why ‘Joy in the Morning’? In Howard Jacobson’s pitch for ‘Rasselass’ on Open Book’s neglected classics programme, he described ‘the pursuit of happiness’ as ‘one way or another….the story of every novel’. He makes great claims for ‘Rasselass’ and I must say that I enjoyed reading it this time much more than I can remember enjoying it when I read it before. I can see now why Jacobson described it as ‘chock full of wisdom’ and I can see myself turning to it again in the future. Curiously, it doesn’t have much to say about happiness except in a negative way – time and again the central characters meet or seek out people who they think are happy and then they (and we) discover why they aren’t happy – so we learn about happiness in a negative way: what happiness isn’t.

In Stephen Graham’s ‘A Tramp’s Sketches’ there’s a chapter: ‘A Thing of Beauty Is A Joy For Ever’ (he likes to poach titles too). After an opening which refers to Nietzsche, Kant, Stendhal, Bernard Shaw, Ibsen and Darwin he hits us with a paragraph of pure Graham:

… knowledge of the beautiful is an affirmation. Something in the soul suddenly rises up and ejaculates “Yes” to some outside phenomenon, and then he is aware that he is looking at Beauty. As he gazes he knows himself in communion with what he sees – and sometimes that communion is a great joy and sometimes a great sadness. Thus, looking at the opening of dawn he is filled with gladness, his spirits rising with the sun; he wishes to shout and sing. He is one with the birds that have begun singing and with all the wild Nature waking refreshed after the night. But looking out at evening of the same day over the grey sea he is filled with unutterable sorrow.

That “Yes”, the idea of a sudden and unexpected affirmation really strikes a chord with me. A feeling, a brimming over almost – intense well being, a broad smile, as Graham says: the need to shout and sing – that can sneak up on me in many circumstances but particularly on a walk. So when I left the house early this morning I had no clear idea where I was heading, but it was with a certain expectation – I was looking for a “Yes” moment.

Of course – going looking for the pot of gold is a fool’s errand and setting off expecting to be thrilled by a view or a moment is almost certainly counter productive. There were some pleasant views to be had…

Pre-dawn cloudscape.

But nothing to quicken the pulse or make the heart soar.

The sky was clear and, wanting to keep the light in the east in view, I set off toward it and toward Leighton Moss.

Reflected trees at Leighton Moss – spooky isn’t it?

After the astonishing rain we’ve been having the meres had spread and the paths were underwater. A sign warning of flooding and the need for Wellington boots was, rather ironically,  marooned on a dry island of path with flooding all around it – you had to get your feet wet in order to get close enough to read it. A huge group of coots and mallards were roosting on the islands just by Lilian’s Hide. I pottered around the edges of the reed beds – exploring almost submerged boardwalks, photographing leaves and reeds…

and then turned for home. A roadside hedge, heavy with haws was being plundered by several blackbirds…

and a thrush.

When I stopped to try to photograph them I realised that there were numerous other birds in the hedge too – great tits and blue tits, chaffinches…

and, in a small ash tree, a nuthatch tap tap tapping at a branch.

As I climbed the hill back toward the village the sun climbed above the horizon…

This turned out to be perfect timing since I was now heading west with views ahead of trees bathed in sunlight.

A tree stump by the road was host to…

some tiny earthballs…

…each hollowed with a jagged exit wound through which the spores had been fired.

I had forgotten by now about my ‘mission’ and was thoroughly absorbed in an attempt to capture the way the low sun was emphasising the remaining autumn colour on certain beech, oak and hazel trees. Not with much success, but it was keeping me busy. In Clark’s Lot, a patch of colour seen distantly across the cleared area of limestone pavement caught my eye…

I thought that it was the rust colour which attracted me, but winding back the zoom on my camera, I realised that in fact it was the contrast between that rust and the white of the surrounding birch trunks which appealed…

…and there it was, quite unexpectedly…joy in the morning! It may not have yielded much of a photo, but I can tell you that this morning, with the sun picking out the leaves, it looked fantastic….and I could feel my smile muscles working overtime, and…is that me singing? I believe it is!

Then of course, Nature conspires to put more flashes of red in my way. A robin in amongst holly berries…too much – tone it down please. Haws against traveller’s joy…

…that’s the ticket!

Sprawling over the fence from the wood, a cotoneaster, presumably grown from a berry carried here by a bird from a garden?

This too is lacking in subtly with both leaves and berries a very rich red…

I think that I prefer the different greens on offer in the lichens (or liverworts?) on this small fallen branch…

* Some alternative titles for this post:

The Sun Also Rises

Happiness Makes Up in Height What it Lacks in Length

Its a new dawn, its a new day, its a new life for me
And I’m feelin good

OK – that last one’s getting a bit long for a title. (Great song though**) Any other suggestions? This is a game that anyone can play.

**When Nina Simone is singing it, not one of the pale imitations by the likes of Muse or Michael Buble. Actually, when the horns come in on this song – that’s another example of one of those face twitching encounters with ‘a joy for ever’.

It’s that time of year, the transition between summer abundance and winter dearth. In the warm months it’s so easy to find something to blog about: life is everywhere. Insects, flowers, birds, green leaves everywhere you turn. The brain gets lazy, there’s no need for it to work overhard. Then come October and November, all that great wealth of life begins to thin out. You go out with your camera to find something to blog about and the brain says, “Are you kidding me? There’s nothing out here!” It’s wrong, of course; there’s still plenty of interesting things going on, stuff to find, but the brain is in summer mode. It will take some effort and time to retrain it into a winter way of thinking and seeing.

Earlier this week I took my brain for a walk into our back fields. It saw nothing, so I made it look closer. “Let’s start with this rock,” I said, “and we’ll go from there.” My brain peered at the rock and saw only rock and moss. I chastised it. “No, look closer. Pay attention. What do you see?”

“Well, those red things are pretty obvious,” Brain said.
“Good!” I applauded. “That’s a great start. British Soldier Lichen, their red caps in full bloom, to produce spores. What else is there?”

“Um. Some spikey mosses. Lots of them there.”
“Yes! Juniper Haircap Moss, Polytrichum juniperinum,” I enthused, including the italics. “Cosmopolitan, occurs on every continent, including Antarctica! It gets reddish ‘flowers’ on the tips when it’s reproducing. You’re doing good! Keep going, what else?”

“Some branchy lichen to the side,” Brain pointed out. “Wait, I think I remember these – reindeer lichen?”
“Excellent! Yes, reindeer lichen, specifically Cladina rangiferina, which can be told apart from Yellow-green Lichen, Cladina mitis, by its blue-gray colour. It’s soft and spongy after a rain, but brittle and crumbles when dry. It’s a major food source of reindeer, hence the name.”

“There’s that curly grass stuff in the little patch there,” Brain said, warming up to the challenge.
“Probably the same stuff we walked through to get here,” I agreed. “Poverty Oatgrass, Danthonia spicata, widespread across most of the continent. It can be identified by the curly tuft of grass at its base. Grows on thin rocky soil and is very resistant to drought, probably why it’s growing in amongst all these mosses and lichens on the rock.”

“Hm. Oh, look! Cup lichen, tucked in beside the British Soldiers.”
“So there is, good eye,” I said. “Cladonia species, perhaps False Pixie Cup, C. chlorophaea, which grows on rocks, among other substrates, and is commonly found with mosses.”

“And the moss has put out spore spikes,” Brain said, now getting up to speed.
“Ah yes, just on the right. Now you’re on a roll. I didn’t even see those till you pointed them out.”

“Some dead cedar leaves, from the cedars at the edge of the rocks, I guess.”
“Seems probable. Deposited here by wind or animal, do you think?” I wondered aloud.

“Look at that cute little plant,” Brain pointed to some red leaves. “So small. Any idea?”
“None whatsoever,” I admitted. “Too bad it doesn’t have any flower heads or seed pods to help. Something to look for next summer, I guess.”

“Oh, and look. It was visited by a rabbit,” Brain finished up by pointed out one final item.
“Eastern Cottontail or Snowshoe Hare?” I joked.
Brain and I stood up from where we’d been stooped over our one-foot-square of rock.
“See? That wasn’t so bad,” I said. “All it needs is a bit of practice to get you back in shape.”
“Yeah, I guess,” Brain said grudgingly.
“You did good. Let’s leave the lesson there for now. We’ll try again later this week, perhaps.”

In no particular order:

1. Big green eyes.

2. Perfect little figs.

3. Luminous lichen.

4. Rockpool slime.

5. Thick, wet moss.

]]> http://gorgeousandgreen.wordpress.com/2009/11/17/sustainable-arrangements-for-the-green-festival/ Tue, 17 Nov 2009 11:49:56 +0000 gorgeousandgreen http://gorgeousandgreen.wordpress.com/2009/11/17/sustainable-arrangements-for-the-green-festival/

For the Green Festival this past weekend in San Francisco, I (Gorgeous and Green Events) donated some large arrangements for their speaker stages.  I used all locally grown flowers and branches, glass vases and no floral foam.  I also did the deliveries in our recycled bio-diesel wagon.  I think the pieces were enjoyed by the crowds because when I came back to pick up (and reuse) the vases, people were asking to take the flowers home to reuse as decor in their homes.

Here are two large arrangements that were about 6 feet tall.  I loved the lichen growing on the branches.

I used amaranth, large roses, spray roses, vintage pink and purple hydrangea, white delphinium, curly willow and tree branches.

In Green and Health,

G&G

Some rare color combinations appear in autumn.  In the spring, when I made this blanket for a Mother’s Day gift, I commented to F. that my color choices reminded me of the season, itself.  Even if some of the pairings were a little unexpected, I could still find every one in the yard or the forest somewhere.  Now that the season is winding down, I find myself seeing some of those same color combos from the spring, and some that are even more unusual.

It’s funny, because in my mind autumn colorways are so mellow and perfectly matched.  And they are beautifully coordinated, of course; the way Nature layers colors and textures, and even sounds and scents, almost always works.  Yet would I choose to mix rich gold, scarlet with burgundy lowlights, and pale grey-blue in a blanket I was making?  Probably not.  Some of the Mission Falls 1824 yarns come close to the colors I’ve seen in nature, but I don’t know if I’m quite that daring.

This photo kind of makes me wonder if I should give it a try, though.

Photo of the day, taken at a Cumby’s parking lot:

Click on image to order prints or note cards on Redbubble:

Tiny shrooms

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Lichens are a strange kind of organism that is partly algae and partly fungi. They exhibit a great deal of variability in shape and colour and are found in all sorts of places – from the splash-zone rocks of the seashore, to high altitude boulders, to living and dead trees and wood, and man-made objects of almost every conveivable material – provided the environment is right. They are supposed to favour clean, fresh air. Each species has a defined habitat preference.

Lichens can be smooth and glossy coatings; dry and scabby encrustations; leaf-like; finely-branched; or lacey. They can grow as individuals that slowly increase in area and/or height. They can grow in groups of the same species that remain separate or that eventually coalesce to form a patchwork of similar colours – perhaps with matching or contrasting dots of colour provided by the fruiting bodies. They can grow intermingled with a variety of other lichen types with different, contrasting, or co-ordinating colours and morphology.

Though difficult to name, they are frequently interesting to observe. The abstract patterns that they make on variable substrates are often attractive and also a source of artistic inspiration.

© Jessica Winder and Jessica’s Nature Blog, 2009. Unauthorised use and/or duplication of this material, including both text and photographs, without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Jessica Winder and Jessica’s Nature Blog with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

 Photographs in this blog are copyright property of Jessica Winder with all rights reserved

The face of tragedy.  We have seen it in the last week, with shootings at Ford Hood and Orlando.  It is impossible  to imagine what the survivors of those horrible events and the loved ones of the murdered must be feeling.   The notions of safety and security are blown away with a gunshot, as people were just going about their daily business, and soldiers were in the place they must have thought was as secure as any place in the world.

The problem of evil.  We can probably never know what was in the minds of the gunmen.  What insanity, what hatred, what complete disregard of humanity allows a person to take the lives of innocents?  It’s not just the theological question of “how is evil present in the world?” but also “how does a person get to the point where he performs such an evil act?”  Questions in the 24-hour news cycle are about whether or not these acts could have been prevented, or how to recognize the signs that tell you danger is looming.  These are good questions, even if they don’t have easy answers, or any answers. 

Maybe it is because of what I do for a living, but my questions are different from those.  I want to know how those who are left can get on with their lives.  What will be the first day when a survivor to the Fort Hood shooting will be able to wake up in the morning without that event being the first thing that comes to mind?  When will the office worker in Orlando be able to walk into that building without looking over her shoulder?  When will the spouse of a victim stop waking in the night wondering how things would have been different if the loved one had been delayed 5 minutes that day?  When will the shooters’ families be able to move beyond their own feelings of guilt and perhaps find one sympathetic listener who won’t blame them?

When I was in the mountains a couple of weeks ago, we were taking a break from our construction work and I wandered around the lot with my camera.  The building space was carved out of a steep hill, which gives the homeowners an incredible view of the knobs and hills out their front door.  About 10 feet from the back of the house is a sheer rock wall of limestone and a small seam of coal.  You’ve seen those types of bluffs.  From even a few feet away, they appear very stark and empty of vegetation, save a scrubby tree here and there that has found root, or a bit of grass on a shelf where some dirt has fallen. 

I started to take pictures of the rocks with their lines and shadows and gradations of gray, but something else caught my eye.   It was tiny, and I would have missed it if I hadn’t slowed down.  It’s some type of lichen, I think.  (I’m not a botanist.  Feel free to correct me.)  It’s about an inch tall, hard to see unless you’re right on top of it.  Though miniscule, it is quite lovely.

© Melissa Bane Sevier, 2009

If I may use this little plant as a metaphor, I see it as a sign of hope.  It grows almost invisibly in a surface that shouldn’t support much life.  In the black and gray of the coal, it is a spot of gray/green, just a little bit of color.  It was startling to discover it, hidden there in a crack in the wall.

Perhaps this is a decent prayer for those who survive tragedy of any kind:  though the hardness cannot be changed, may life someday again spring up.  Though no one else can know their suffering, or feel what they feel, may there be a place, perhaps hidden even to them at this point, where God can again plant hope and love, peaceful days and restful nights, the kindness of strangers and the beauty of  friendship.  Though nights are dark and even the days are gray, may color soon begin to make its way once again into their consciousness.  May they pay attention and someday be startled again by the discovery of something good growing in the place where cold gray hardness now reigns.

© Melissa Bane Sevier, 2009

For all lichen enthusiasts out there, (you know who you are)… join us in celebrating the wonderful mini landscapes that exist out there on twigs, rocks & gravestones.

Inspiration strikes in peculiar ways. The simple beauty of stones & the vivid colours of lichens in our small Welsh village drove us all ‘Wabi Sabi’ and we ended up making this set of four 1″ badges. More details >

Ever thoughtful of the environment, we’ve made each packet from recycled grey jumpers. There’s something about knitted wool that seems to echo natural stone.

Don’t ask us to name the lichen featured… rough guesses would include a Leafy Xanthoria, Parmelia and Cushion Xanthoria; but only serious lichen experts would know.
jen

Today’s photo was taken yesterday, at Fort Phoenix State Reservation in Fairhaven, Mass.

Click on image to order prints or note cards on Redbubble

Lichen and marble

A tiny world of moss and lichen! Macro setting is AMAZING. My lichen collection becomes the matte-est, most colourful lunar landscape of unimaginable detail. So winsy, that even my A1, close-up vision can’t take in the complexity. After taking these photos, it was only when I got to the computer and enlarged the photos that the hidden worlds were revealed.

Make sure you click on the images above, to get the full effect, (they should open as an enlargement). For those who haven’t made friends yet with the different settings on their digital camera – the macro setting, (tulip symbol) has got to be one of the more instantly rewarding – not to be confused with the zoom, of course.

According to the British Lichen Society, lichens (pronounced either litchens or likens) are part fungus, part alga. Contrary to popular wisdom, they don’t feed on the stones or other surfaces that they grow on and they are fantastic ‘litmus tests’ of local air quality. The Natural History Museum has just launched a lichen watch survey where you can investigate the fascinating micro-world of lichens.
jen

Halloween brings thoughts

of decay

and the permission to eat

chocolate.

Neringa ripples toward me

as I approach down the slope

of her wet leaves.

Immediately,

I want to consumate our movement–

drink her up,

have her take

me.

Neither will do,

so I continue up the road

on this Hallow’s Eve Day,

sensing the transparency

of the worlds

in my bones.

The air mysteriously moves

through

me,

mocking the illusion of

separation.

With eyes no longer

drawn up

by Autumn’s fiery reds,

my gaze

sinks

to the earth–

to her rich

colors of

death.

I float to

the place and  beauty

of my own

mother’s

passing

until I discover a half-dozen

trees

missing

from the banks

of the pond–

beavers,

hired

to clear my view.

Turning toward home,

I find four trunks

huddled together,

branches wrapped around

each other’s

back,

bare–

except for lichen,

a soft, sickly green

creeping up each body,

dangling

from each limb.

On this dark day of souls

I wonder~

Does the ghost of sweet

Jesse

roam

these

hills

like me?

Kelly Salasin, Oct. 31, 2009

Byłem dziś od rana w Licheniu, dziwna sprawa. Tak trochę przypadkiem tam trafiłem i nie miałem zbyt wiele czasu dla siebie. Niecałą godzinę. Fajny motyw, z jednej strony wielka bazylika złotem utytłana, a z drugiej pole gnojem ubarwione

Ładnie tam całkiem jest, wchodząc za wysokie mury terenów kościelnych można poczuć klimat jesieni. Teraz jest tam ładnie i spokojnie, ale ciekawe co się tam dzieje w czasie świąt wszelkich kiedy chordy moherów tam wojują. Tak na serio nie chcę wiedzieć… Już teraz widziałem ‘fajne’ stoiska, gdzie sprzedawali w jednym miejscu zabawki i znicze. Zdjęcie na kliszy mam niestety.

Licheńska Święta Woda

A to oto poniżej uwiecznione stworzenie zauważyłem na chodniku niedaleko bazyliki. Kiedy kucnąłem kiciak przybiegł do mnie ochoczo, potem nagle wskoczył mi na kolana, przy okazji uderzając się w głowę o aparat który w ręku trzymałem. Mruczał radośnie, a potem biegał za mną jakiś czas. Miłe stworzenie

Earlier this month (October 2009) I spent about a considerable amount of time in the Eastern Sierra of California, which is one of my favorite places to photograph. I conduct photograph workshops in this location every year about the same time ( 2010 will be no different). However, this year represented some challenges which haven’t occurred in many years. The fall color not only was late, but in some of the usually top image producing locations, the color looked looked like it would fizzle out.

Oh well, just being in this location is special…… color or not. The smell of the sage is like no where else.  The vistas and areas around Mono Lake and Bishop are great anytime of year. It was also great to catch up with some friends who are usually there in October as well.

California has received little rain the past  2 years and this past summer was very hot. Many of the locals as well as seasoned photographers I met there agreed that the aspens and cottonwoods were stressed and probably would just go from green to brown. I know my attendees were expecting some color so I set out to find some. Since this workshop was a Macro &More  workshop, with my good friend Mike Moats ( www.tinylandscapes.com) finding color and subject material was even more important.

Sage & rabbit bush close to Mono Lake

After camping  on Thursday night along Tioga Pass  with fellow photographers Preston Birdwell and Michael Gordon ( both great large format shooters…  www.gildedmoon.com and www.michael-gordon.com ), I met  another good friend, and a veteran of many past photography workshops Greg Duncan on Friday www.gregduncanphotography.com … a few days prior to the workshop to do some scouting.  Many of the images below were results of scouting the area from, Bishop, north to Lee Vining to find some interesting locations. We were pretty successful.  

Sunrise at North Lake, west of Bishop Ca.  Note the green cottonwoods right next to the almost yellow aspens!

Greg headed over to Yosemite on Saturday with another good friend and fellow workshop instructor Ralph Nordstrom ( www.ralphnordstromphotography.com) (Ralph and I will be joining forces once again for our 2nd annual Death Valley workshop in Feb 2010!). Though I drove over with them, for  a lot of reasons I decided to get back over the “east side” before the impending storm hit later on Saturday night…. and yes it hit!.

Sunday morning brought temperatures in the teens and up to 6-7″ of snow, depending where you were. Tioga and Sonora passes were closed until Tuesday and Greg was stuck in Yosemite ( I can think of worse places to be stuck in. He got some amazing images there… check them out at www.gregduncanphotoraphy.com)

But I was in paradise… new snow, clearing sky’s, all in my one  of my favorite locations with a day or two to shoot before my attendees got into town!  This is a good example of reading the weather, being prepared and being there in the right light and conditions, not only  to get some decent images, but enjoy this unique location.

Some of these images were taken before the workshop and a  during. I’ll discuss what drew me to these images and why they work for me. There compressed JPEG images don’t do the original files justice. I’ll share some thoughts I had when I took them as well as looking at them here.

I’m  already anticipating next year in the Eastern Sierra.

This image was taken in the morning at North Lake as well. The reflections were great . What drew me into this images however, was the one tall pine tree, which added another dynamic to the pastel colors of the surrounding trees. Imagine this image without it. I would not have taken this image without it.

The image on the right was taken not far from North Lake in a small stream on the road to Lake Sabrina. Greg and I took lots of time here and got some other interesting shots. This was taken using my Singh Ray VARI-ND filter ( www.singh-ray.com ). This is about a 6 second exposure. it really adds to the texture of the water.

ON the left is another image made with the Singh-Ray Vari-ND.

 This was a 10 second exposure. One note on the leaves… I am not one to add things to images that aren’t there. 2 of these leaves were there, right side up. Did someone else put them there? Maybe… I added the 3rd to make the image stronger.

The repeating patterns of the water coming over the rocks in a hook like fashion along with the deep coloration of the water makes this image work for me.

  Is there anything better than the late afternoon pastel light as the sun goes down at Mono Lake?

 Lenticular clouds sometime are a signal of weather changes. They occur only over very tall mountain peaks and are quite common in the eastern Sierra Nevada Mountains. This one however,was one of the biggest I’ve ever seen. There were major lenticular all over the Owens Valley and Mono Basin this Saturday afternoon. The storm hit Saturday night and this cloud was  forbearing of what was to come.  This location is right over Crowley Lake off HWY 395. I really like the shadow of the cloud against the yellow grassland near Crowley Lake. Blue & yellow always works well.

  Monday morning brought a totally different look to Lundy Canyon. Gone were the clouds and the contrast became somewhat of a problem. This is actually a pan image made from stitching 2 images together. Having the snow here added to the image. If only the aspens were changing as they should have been! I did not use a polarizer here for 2 reasons. Ore, you never use one when taking pan images and two, the sky would have been a dark navy blue at this elevation, looking very unrealistic

Here is Lundy Lake.  The subject to me here is the pattern of the snow meeting at a point in the reflection in the water. This may be my favorite image of the trip. I’ve never seen the water this flat with these kind of weather conditions in this canyon. If you look close on the mountain side, you can see some of the yellows of the aspens emerging between the patterns of the snow and the mountain. It impossible for you a viewer , who may have not been to this location like this to understand the majestic and the overall size of this canyon and lake. The pine trees on the mountain side are upwards of 100′ high. They look like twigs in this image. 

The water on the lower beaver pond was frozen on Monday morning. This log is about a foot under water. I was attracted to the white dots of ice embedded in the ice itself. The patterns of the ice as well as the color added attracted me to make this image as well. 

While scouting Convict Lake, for about 20 seconds a ray of sunlight sent a beam of light onto these aspens on my left. I underexposed the background to enhance the glow of the trees both on the land and especially in the water. Literally 10-20seconds later this light disappeared. 

 I really like to photograph the earthy tones on some of the trees in the area. I was attracted to the patterns of the wood with the slight hint of yellow in the texture. This was shot with my Nikon 200mm  F4 Macro lens.

Here is another, but somewhat busier. Finding patterns in the tree bark isn’t as easy as you may think. You really have to work the subject.

This images was made with my Nikon 200mm Macro + a 6T (62mm) diopter. The lichen is nearly perfect in shape. The Orange color works well against the rock face. These images are found all over within the “grand scenic” type images , you just have to look around.

This images was taken with my Nikon 80-200mm Lens. I liked how this leave fell onto this rock, which in and of itself would have made an interesting macro image.

We spent some time photographing Bodie, the old ghost town just south of Bridgeport and North of Mono Lake. I only took a few images. The first is a reflection of one of the old buildings in Bodie and the sky from a window. The torn window dressing really tells a story and adds to the image.

Here is a photograph taken through an opening in the door, exposing the newspaper lined wall paper of one of the rooms in this house. I guess they used newspaper for added insulation. Bodie is about 9000′ elevation and has very harsh winters. The newspaper was in good enough shape that you can make out the words and type very well.

These old bottles were lined up and photographed through a window. I don’t like shooting through windows since the clarity is often diminished. I chose to use a large aperture in order to make the bottles in the back less sharp than the front. ( Check out Greg Duncan’s shot on his web site.. he took the opposite approach, both have redeeming qualities).

We took an afternoon up above 10,000′ in the White Mt’s to photograph the ancient bristle cone pine trees. These are the oldest living “things” on the planet. This tree might date back over 3000 years. Like some other photographs, I know this one would be a black & white images as well when I took it. The subject of the tree is interesting and the clouds bending in a directional pattern adds to the overall drama of this image.

Finally, a Mono Lake Sunrise and Sunset.

There was just a hint of fog on the water during this sunrise which made things a little more interesting.

This sunset image was shot after almost everyone left, thinking that the light was over. There must have been over 100 folks with cameras ( note I did not say photographers) at Mono Lake this afternoon.  There was literally not one parking spot in the lot when we arrived. We had to park along the road leading into the lot. When things appeared to have fizzled out all but a handful left. We were rewarded with some wonderful light and alpenglow.

And finally, on October 4th the moon was full. However the lake was choppy due to a strong wind blowing from the north. As slow shutter speed allowed me to create the smooth form of the water. Here the full October moon is rising from the east. 

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Large stones are my favorite garden elements. With a little time many interesting non-flowering plants begin to grow on a rock. Embryophytes like ferns and mosses follow lichens, which are a combination of compatible algae and fungi.

Lichens have a good hold on this rock.

Buffy, showing where bits of moss are starting to grow among the lichens. Buffy likes to gnaw crumbling limestone rocks.

One of the stones that have been in my garden longest, this one not only has several kinds of moss, it has common polypody fern and a little spleenwort. I did nothing to attract the ferns; moss was encouraged with leftover buttermilk poured on every stone.

Notice little fingers of the moss beginning to spread.

Bare rocks with fossils are interesting. Our limestone rocks underground hold many different sea creatures from the time when the coastal plain was under the sea. Imprints of mussel or clam shells are commonly seen.

Algae growing on this rock is a precursor to lichens and moss.

Water has dissolved limestone in places, leaving depressions, sometimes large enough for a birdbath. Used for a birdbath, this stone, roughly 2 feet square, has moss growing from the constant damp.

Stones are not common on the ground here. They are usually underground. You may see piles of huge limestone rocks along the side of a cleared field where they were dug out to make cultivation easier. The stones in my front beds were mostly dug in one field and hauled in.

Stones hold the history of the World. Thank you for looking at my Rocks, as precious to me as Diamonds.