Tag Archives: autumn

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Sierra Nevada, Photographs: Yosemite

Autumn Leaves, Winter Snow

March 3, 2018 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

New snow partially covers autumn oak leaves along a Yosemite Valley trail

Sometimes in California I can experience at least three seasons on the same day. (I’ve occasionally wondered if I could cram evidence of all four into a single photograph, but so far haven’t figure out how.) For example, it isn’t impossible to find a scene that includes brown autumn leaves, snow, and new growth. A hot autumn day might include fall colors and perhaps a recent snow flurry on high peaks. Travel less than 100 miles from an inland area to the Northern California coast and go from 100+ degree temperatures to cold and wet enough that you might want a pair of gloves. Descend from a snowy peak, through forest, and end up in desert.

By those standards, this photograph perhaps falls short, as only two seasons are represented — the winter snow flurry and the brown leaves of autumn oak trees. It was not snowing as I made the photography, but it had snowed just a few hours earlier here in Yosemite Valley, and as I hiked along the base of granite cliffs and past conifers and oaks there were still places where the snow had not melted.

All media © Copyright G Dan Mitchell and others as indicated. Any use requires advance permission from G Dan Mitchell.

Photographs: Central California, Photographs: Fall, Photographs: Fall Color, Photographs: Nature

Pond, Trees, Sky

December 14, 2017 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Colorful trees arranged around San Joaquin Valley wetlands under autumn sky with clearing fog

When I have written about some of the previous photographs of these San Joaquin Valley areas, where I go to photograph birds in the late fall and winter, I have described the cycle of my earlier mornings in such places: awake hours before sunrise, a two-hour drive in the dark, frequent arrival in thick tule fog, the first sound of birds after I stop my car and get out, the sensations related to photographing in the cold and foggy morning, the first light, sunrise. This photograph comes from a bit later in the morning, closer to the time when the rapidly changing early morning conditions stabilize and things begin to seem more static.

On this morning there had been some of the usual tule fog at daybreak. I photographed in those conditions for the first hour or two, but by 8:00 the fog was mostly gone and all that remained of it was the common Central Valley winter haze. Above that was the huge expanse of sky that I’m often aware of here — sky stretching unbroken from the low hills in the west to the distance Sierra Nevada crest far to the east. By this time the birds were generally much less active and the quick pace of the sunrise hours gave way to the slow, still quality of the midday hours.

All media © Copyright G Dan Mitchell and others as indicated. Any use requires advance permission from G Dan Mitchell.

Photographs: Central California, Photographs: Fall, Photographs: Fall Color, Photographs: Nature

Marshland Trees, Autumn Haze

December 12, 2017 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Marshland trees with fall foliage on a hazy San Joaquin day.

This was quite a day — San Francisco Bay Area to the San Joaquin Valley to the Sierra foothills and back, sunrise alone in tule fog among the birds to the crowded (and fun!) reception for the “AVIAN — Birds in a Changing World” exhibit in Oakhurst, and lots of driving!

The day began with my pre-dawn arrival in the San Joaquin Valley wetlands, where tule fog was forming as the first light appeared. Although it was a weekend morning, there was almost no one else out there besides me and a few thousand birds. I saw a giant flight of what I believe were trim-color blackbirds in the distance — I’ve never seen so many at one before — and then an impressive dawn fly-out of sandhill cranes. A bit later in the morning, once the early morning bird action had subsided, I spent a bit of time photographing the landscape. This beautiful tree, with late-season autumn color, is striking in its quiet presence in this mostly flat landscape of ponds and grasslands and, of course, birds.

Photographs: Birds, Photographs: Central California, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Wildlife

Geese, Tule Fog, Autumn Trees

December 6, 2017 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Migratory snow geese and Ross’s geese in a pond on a foggy San Joaquin Valley morning

Since it was December 1, it seemed like time to start my annual series of visits to California’s Great Central Valley to photograph migratory birds and the landscape of the place. (Actually, I had made one preliminary and very quick visit about a month earlier, but too early for the birds shown in this photograph.) There is a ritual about these visits which, for me, are typically one-day affairs that start very early and end rather late, with a fair amount of driving involved. Up well before dawn, I drive a couple of hours in darkness and often fog, arriving perhaps a half hour before dawn to the stirring sound of many thousands of birds, already awake at morning twilight. I photograph intensively for at least a few hours before taking, at last on most days, a midday break. By mid-afternoon I’m back at work again, photographing through the peak of the visual crescendo just before sunset and then continuing for perhaps another half hour or so until the light is gone. I pack, get into my vehicle, and retrace my two-hour drive back home. (At least the shorter daylight hours of this season allow me to get up a little bit “later” — if you consider 3:45 or 4:00 AM later — and return home in time for a late dinner.)

On this first day of December it was incredibly foggy when I arrived — so much so that it was really hard to make photographs. I usually enjoy photographing in the fog, but this was so thick that almost no sunrise light managed to color the gloom. But before long the light began to come through the fog and eventually I found a moderately large group of white geese settled in on a pond. Among them I saw Ross’s and snow geese, and beyond them there were trees with fall foliage.

G Dan Mitchell Photography

Tag Archives: autumn

Autumn Leaves, Winter Snow

Pond, Trees, Sky

Marshland Trees, Autumn Haze

Geese, Tule Fog, Autumn Trees

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