Tag Archives: ice

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Sierra Nevada

Black Aspen Leaves, Frost

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Black Aspen Leaves, Frost - Blackened aspen leaves in frost following an early fall snowfall, eastern Sierra Nevada
Blackened aspen leaves in frost following an early fall snowfall, eastern Sierra Nevada

Black Aspen Leaves, Frost. Eastern Sierra Nevada, California. October 8, 2011. © Copyright 2012 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Blackened aspen leaves in frost following an early fall snowfall, eastern Sierra Nevada

This is a photograph from last year’s (2011) aspen color season in the eastern Sierra Nevada range of California. It was a bit on an unusual season, though in the end it turned out to be one that provided quite a lot of aspen beauty of various sorts. Because that autumn followed the second of two winters with greater-than-normal precipitation in the Sierra, there was a lot of lush and healthy plant growth of all sorts, and even as the end of the summer season arrived there was a lot of greenery about. Then, just as the color season started near the beginning of October, a series of three winter-like storms traversed the range and dropped a foot or more of early season snow. While some snow isn’t unusual at this time of year, a sequence of three storms and that amount of snowfall are unusual. All of the trans-Sierra passes closed for several days.

I came across Tioga Pass on the day that it reopened, and then headed south to the prime aspen-hunting grounds above Bishop, California. The next morning I decided to head up to the North Lake area, and I found the gravel road still snow-covered. I drove on up carefully, and it appeared that I might have been among the very first to try the road after the snow. Needless to say, the storms had a big effect on the aspen leaves! Many of the “ripest” and most colorful leaves had fallen, leaving the trees a bit more bare than usual at this time. And, perhaps due to the cold, rather than turning red and orange and golden-yellow, quite a few leaves went straight to black. Now I’m as attracted to the wildly colorful aspen leaves as anyone, but I’m also intrigued by somewhat unusual conditions, so I found some of the blackened leaves to be interesting, too. In the early hours I found this cluster, no doubt blown down and piled together during the storm, sitting on top of the snow bank and covered with crystalline frost from the previous night.

G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer whose subjects include the Pacific coast, redwood forests, central California oak/grasslands, the Sierra Nevada, California deserts, urban landscapes, night photography, and more.
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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: Nature, Photographs: Northern California, Photographs: Sierra Nevada, Photographs: Yosemite

Pine Cones and Ice, Reflected Sky

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Pine Cones and Ice, Reflected Sky - Pine cones on morning ice, blue with reflected light from the sky, Yosemite National Park.
Pine cones on morning ice, blue with reflected light from the sky, Yosemite National Park.

Pine Cones and Ice, Reflected Sky. Yosemite National Park, California. June 19, 2011. © Copyright 2011 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Pine cones on morning ice, blue with reflected light from the sky, Yosemite National Park.

I’m on a bit of a minor Yosemite run right now, as I’ve found a bit of extra time to get back to my review of the past ten year’s of image files. I had almost completed the task earlier this year, but the work stalled out a few months back somewhere in the spring of 2011. I’m now up to June of that year and hoping to continue the slog!

I made this photograph right about the time that Tioga Pass first opened for the season – not the first day, but very close to it. I had gotten up very early that morning to photograph in the pre-dawn cold near Tioga Pass, and from there began to work my way back to the west towards Tuolumne Meadows. I stopped at a small roadside lake to photograph a larger scene and as I was setting up for that shot I looked down and noticed the newly formed ice with its fractured texture reflecting the morning’s blue sky and supporting a variety of things that had blown down including a couple of pine cones. If you look carefully you can just make out rocks and grasses beneath the ice.

G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer whose subjects include the Pacific coast, redwood forests, central California oak/grasslands, the Sierra Nevada, California deserts, urban landscapes, night photography, and more.
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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: Nature, Photographs: Northern California, Photographs: People, Photographs: Yosemite

Tenaya Lake, January 2012

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Tenaya Lake, January 2012 - Skaters and walkers on frozen Tenaya Lake, accessible via the still-open Tioga Pass Road on January 16, 2012.
Skaters and walkers on frozen Tenaya Lake, accessible via the still-open Tioga Pass Road on January 16, 2012.

Tenaya Lake, January 2012. Yosemite National Park, California. January 16, 2012. © Copyright 2012 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Skaters and walkers on frozen Tenaya Lake, accessible via the still-open Tioga Pass Road on January 16, 2012.

I have been meaning to post this photograph since I made it last month, on January 16, 2012. The serious California drought (or so it seems) of 2012 created very unusual conditions in the Sierra this winter. The Tioga Pass Road (highway 120) through Yosemite National Park usually closes by some time in November, and has been known to close as early as October. The early season this year made it appear that we might have a normal or even heavier than normal winter – early storms near the beginning of October brought a lot of snow to the range and temporarily closed the road more than once. But by December it became clear that this was not going to be a normal year at all, and by the end of the month there was almost no snow anywhere in the range.

A week before this visit I had crossed and re-crossed the pass on a trip to Death Valley. While I appreciated the convenience and shorter drive, I found the odd conditions unnerving. Aside from a few patches here and there, I saw no snow at all, though the seasonal cold had frozen the high country lakes. A week later it looked like a storm or two might finally arrive, so we decided to make the trip up to the Tuolumne area to see the high country in a state that we probably (hopefully!) won’t see again. During the week before this visit, local news stations around California had made this story well known, and they almost all mentioned that people were visiting Tenaya Lake. And, indeed, there were tons of people at the lake when we arrived. There were about as many cars as you might see on an August afternoon. People were clustered along the frozen edge of the lake, were walking along its borders, even setting up tables for picnics on the ice. A few people thought to bring ice skates and they were skating great distances. (Fortunately for us, most people went no farther than Tenaya, and the crowds decreased rapidly after that point.)

G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer whose subjects include the Pacific coast, redwood forests, central California oak/grasslands, the Sierra Nevada, California deserts, urban landscapes, night photography, and more.
Blog | About | Flickr | Twitter | Facebook | Google+ | 500px.com | LinkedIn | Email

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: Nature, Photographs: Northern California, Photographs: Sierra Nevada, Photographs: Yosemite

Snowflakes, Grass, and Frozen Lake

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Snowflakes, Grass, and Frozen Lake - Fresh snowflakes among leaves of grass on the frozen surface of Siesta Lake, Yosemite National Park.
Fresh snowflakes among leaves of grass on the frozen surface of Siesta Lake, Yosemite National Park.

Snowflakes, Grass, and Frozen Lake. Yosemite National Park, California. January 16, 2012. © Copyright 2012 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Fresh snowflakes among leaves of grass on the frozen surface of Siesta Lake, Yosemite National Park.

This past week we had the opportunity to do something that we’ll probably not get to do again – drive over Tioga Pass through Yosemite National Park in the middle of January. Until this year, the latest the road had been open was December 31. This year it was still open on January 17, though scheduled to close as I write this. It has been a very unusual weather year in many parts of California, including the Sierra. While the season began with earlier and heavier than usual snow storms way back in early October, this promising start to the snow season was just a tease. A month or so later, the tap was turned off and there was little rain through the end of the calendar year and on into January of 2012.

So with this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity about to end with the promise of snow this week, we drove up the night before and then headed over Tioga Pass Road to Lee Vining and back, stopping frequently along the way. The weather in the morning was a bit of a surprise. I knew that a weak weather system – that had not brought any rain – was departing the Sierra, but we were surprised when we encountered very light snow flurries as we drove up Crane Flat Road to the junction with highway 120, and this continued as we started up Tioga Pass Road. When we arrived at Siesta Lake we found it partly sunny but still trying to snow just a bit. I set up to make a photograph of some trees in cloud-softened light, but as soon as I was ready to shoot the light died! I waited for a while, but finally decided that the light wasn’t returning. I decided to wander over to this small lake and see what I could find along the shoreline – and I found these dormant grasses, half-submerged in winter ice, with a sprinkling of snowflakes on the surface of the ice.

G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer whose subjects include the Pacific coast, redwood forests, central California oak/grasslands, the Sierra Nevada, California deserts, urban landscapes, night photography, and more.
Blog | About | Flickr | Twitter | Facebook | Google+ | 500px.com | LinkedIn | Email

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.