Tag Archives: america

Photographs: Central California, Photographs: Nature

Corn Field, Fog

January 27, 2015 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

The winter remains of a corn field in San Joaquin Valley

I used to imagine that wildlife refuges, those areas that are intended to provide habitat for wild critters, were something like parks of wilderness. Since I’ve been photographing winter birds in California I have learned that this presumption is usually dead wrong. There are a few such places that are left in their natural state, but many of them are distinctly non-natural locations. (Many are also there because hunters want to ensure that birds are there for them.) Quite a few of these places are agricultural, including some that I often visit.

I’ve seen some where the flooded winter fields were rice fields. This one is a corn field during much of the year and part of a very interesting and busy wildlife refuge in the winter. As I was there photographing birds recently, I looked across a field of dead corn plants fading into the distant fog and something about this desolate scene seemed worth a photograph, and I like the rather different mood that it evokes for me.

Text, photographs, and other media are © Copyright G Dan Mitchell (or others when indicated) and are not in the public domain and may not be used on websites, blogs, or in other media without advance permission from G Dan Mitchell.

Photographs: Mono Lake Basin

Evening Shadows, Mono Lake

January 26, 2015 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Evening shadows fall across the western shore and islands of Mono Lake

The landscape of Mono Lake, near Lee Vining, California, provides a stark contrast to the Sierra Nevada just to the west. From the alpine ridges of the Sierra along and just north of Yosemite, the eastern slopes of the range drop quickly to Lee Vining and the broad valley beyond. The lake sits in a dry basin that has no outlet, so the water simply (for the most part) evaporates.

The lake is huge, stretching far to the east beyond Lee Vining. The landscape of the lake is simple, partly because the surrounding area was once submerged when the lake was much larger than it is today. Far in the distance is Boundary Peak and the ridge of the White Mountains. The sun sets early here, since the tall peaks of the Sierra raise to the west, and in this photograph deep shadows are already angling across the western shores of the lake.

Photographs: Central California, Photographs: Flight, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Northern California, Photographs: Wildlife

White-Fronted Geese

January 25, 2015 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

A flock of white-fronted geese in flight about the San Joaquin Valley

I have probably mentioned previously that I am not by nature a “birder” type. In fact, my infatuation with photographing birds is a relatively new thing — I’ve photographed landscapes for years, but only became so interested in birds a few years ago. Because of this I’m having the wonderful experience of learning about a completely new world even though I’ve been photographing for decades! When I first went to California’s Central Valley to find and photograph birds, I didn’t quite know what I would see, but my attention was understandably attracted to the big groups of sandhill cranes and white (most Ross’s) geese.

Eventually, as I returned to these places and got to know them better, I have begun to pay more attention to critters that I either didn’t notice before or that I dismissed as not being special. The white-fronted geese (which, oddly, are mostly dark in color) fit into this group. When I was entirely focused on the white Ross’s geese, I regarded these darker birds as a sort of unwelcome intrusion — nothing special about them! Then I began to notice them more, settled in on the ground in fields, or providing a dark contrast to the white masses of Ross’s geese — and eventually I stopped ignoring them and began to include them in my photography.

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Sierra Nevada

Morning Snow, Eastern Sierra

January 23, 2015 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Sunrise snow along the eastern escarpment of the Sierra Nevada

This is a part of California that probably impresses newcomers as being more of a desert than anything else, with rugged high elevation sagebrush country standing in front of the rocky and even more rugged eastern escarpment of the Sierra, where the creeks and lakes and forest glades of the range’s intimate landscape are too far away to be visible. I first loved the Sierra for its alpine wilderness, and back then I was not interested in places like this, but today I find them as much part of the Sierra experience as any alpine lake.

As I do every year at about this time, I was on the “east side” for the fall aspen color. And, as happens at least once every year, I was so distracted by some other element of the terrain that I forgot about aspens for a moment and went off to photograph something else. This “something else” was a combination of things. A light morning snow storm was clearing away from the highest peaks in the early morning light of this autumn day. This light was soft on the thinning clouds and snow flurries was stronger, direct, and more stark on the foreground of sage-covered desert hills

G Dan Mitchell Photography

Tag Archives: america

Corn Field, Fog

Evening Shadows, Mono Lake

White-Fronted Geese

Morning Snow, Eastern Sierra

Photographer and visual opportunist. Daily photos since 2005, plus articles, reviews, news, and ideas.