Tag Archives: ggnra

Photographs: Coastal Redwoods, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Northern California

Mushrooms, Redwood Forest

March 29, 2014 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Mushrooms grow in the damp soil beneath Muir Woods National Monument redwood forest

On this late spring morning at Muir Woods National Monument I was on the hunt for trillium flowers. Sometimes when I’m looking for one thing I may tend to overlook other interesting things that are right under my nose. I was looking from trillium flowers… and I only saw trillium flowers. But eventually there often comes a moment when I sort of take a slow breath, look away from that central focus, and see the other things around me.

On a damp late spring morning at Muir Woods that “other things” is quite possibly some small living thing that might be hidden away in shadows or down so close to the soil that I don’t see it. And so it was with this small group of mushrooms, poking up from the damp earth in a very shady little spot on a steep section of the hill running alongside my trail. And once I saw this group of fungi, my focus changed and I began to see other mushrooms all over this small spot where a moment before I had only seen dirt.

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: Coastal Redwoods, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Northern California

Redwood Branches, Morning

March 21, 2014 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Coast redwood branches in morning light, Muir Woods National Monument

In the middle of March it seemed like a typical California end-of-winter day… sunny, warm, and wildflowers beginning to bloom. (Those of you in colder climates perhaps are envious, but some of us here miss winter and feel a slight be of regret when the warm season begins to arrive. ) We ended up at Muir Woods very early in the morning—so early that the official entry kiosk was not yet open and that we got a parking space in the first parking lot! We wandered into the park and walked up through the redwood forest that borders the creek that runs down the valley through which the main, popular trails run. A few hours later, when tour buses arrive from San Francisco, this place would become noisy and crowded, but at this early morning hour it was still quiet.

We moved on toward a trail where trillium flowers are easy to find, a trail that parallels the creek some distance up the side slope. Although my attention was mostly on the ground on the uphill side of the trail, where the trillium were blooming, I also kept an eye on the valley on the downslope side. From this vantage point it is possible to get a rare straight-on view of the trunks of the redwoods, and occasionally the morning sun would make it all the way down into this valley and back-light redwood and other trees. Here I was taken by the three primary layers in this little scene. The foreground redwood branch are curved and bright green in the morning sun. Beyond are moss-covered branches that almost glow in the back-light. And beyond all of this are the dark and shadowed forest trees on the far side of the canyon, not yet in the sunlight.

Photographs: Coastal Redwoods, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Northern California

Purple Trillium

March 15, 2014 G Dan Mitchell 2 Comments

A purple trillium flower against a background of green leaves

Visiting Muir Woods National Monument to photograph trillium flowers is almost a late-winter tradition for me. It is also close to becoming a tradition to forget that it is time for trillium, and then realize just in time that they are in bloom. A week or so ago I realized that my previous trillium photographs from this location had been made in early March… so I would have to go now or else miss them this year! In this California drought year — now the third in a row — I wasn’t sure what I would find. Some recent rains had finally brought water to the area, and the creek through the monument was flowing and the ground was actually a bit wet, though it was far from the muddy place that is more typical at this time of year. New plant growth was beginning, albeit less lush than I am used to seeing in this coastal redwood forest.

We did find blooming trillium plants. There were fewer than in some recent years, and many of them seemed to have already blossomed, but with a bit of searching I was able to find some worthy of photographing. This year I decided I wanted to photograph them very close up, so I used a piece of equipment that often lives in my bag for months without ever coming out, a simple extension tube. I was able to position the camera almost directly over this flower, which let me make a background that consists entirely of the larger leaves of the plant.

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Northern California, Photographs: Ocean & Coast

Headlands, Pacific Ocean, Dusk

March 5, 2014 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Dusk light silhouettes the rugged Marin headlands above the Pacific Ocean disappearing into distant haze.

On a day that began with a visit to the De Young Museum (the final weekend of the David Hockney exhibit) we ended up with some hours of free time in San Francisco… so we decided to head across the Golden Gate and try to be in position somewhere for interesting evening light. We didn’t really have a concrete plan, and we could have ended up in the headlands, along the bay, or perhaps further north along the coast. We stopped for coffee and killed a bit of time in the mid-afternoon light, and by the time we finished the early winter sunset was closer than we had expected.

Looking at the late hour (hey, it was a “vacation day!”) we realized that we didn’t have nearly as much time as we imagined, so we quickly figured out that our best bet was just to head back into the Marin Headlands on the very popular Conzelman Road – yes, the place where hundreds or thousands of people go almost every evening to watch the sun set or the fog roll in (or, sometimes, just a plain old wall of fog!) over the Golden Gate. We drove up the road and the crowds were, as expected, large enough that there were few places to park. In fact, I had to pass up a few possible photographic subjects since I could not stop. Eventually we found a place to pull over and get out and take a look. It was a pretty evening, but the view of the City was not unusually spectacular and I left my camera equipment in the car and just enjoyed the evening view and crisp air. As I stood there, I saw that the backlight over the Pacific outside the golden gate was starting to produce a beautiful diffused light over the water as the atmosphere became increasingly opaque toward the horizon. So I grabbed the tripod and camera and walked up the road a ways to make a few photographs of the ocean and the steep, rugged Marin Headlands cliffs plunging toward the edge of the water.

G Dan Mitchell Photography

Tag Archives: ggnra

Mushrooms, Redwood Forest

Like this:

Redwood Branches, Morning

Like this:

Purple Trillium

Like this:

Headlands, Pacific Ocean, Dusk

Like this:

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

Share this page:

Like this:

Share this page:

Like this:

Share this page:

Like this:

Share this page:

Like this:

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