Tag Archives: trees

Photographs: Fall, Photographs: Fall Color, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Sierra Nevada

Autumn Evening, Eastern Sierra

October 3, 2016 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Hazy evening light on golden meadow, aspen trees, and ascending slopes, eastern Sierra Nevada

When I travel to the Eastern Sierra at this time of year, I always begin my trips with aspen color as my object. But once I get there I often — once again! — find a myriad of other subjects I associate just as much with the fall season. I made this photograph in the evening, not long before actual sunset, as the last sunlight was coming across the crest of the range and sweeping down across the dry eastern slopes. Rounded ridges, broken here and there by rocky outcroppings and scattered groves of trees, ascend toward the monumental eastern escarpment, here muted by autumn haze.

This spot is wild but not wilderness. A small cabin sits in the meadow at the base of the hills, gravel roads cut through the landscape, and at this time of year photographers, hunters, anglers, ranchers, and aspen-seekers follow gravel roads far up these slopes. This is a transitional zone, between the high sagebrush desert to the east and the conifer forest far above, and it is not the same Sierra of granite and conifer forests that most of us associate with the range. But if you travel up and down the east side much, you eventually learn that it is as much “Sierra Nevada” as any landscape.

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

Photographs: Fall, Photographs: Fall Color, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Sierra Nevada

Small Aspens, Boulders

September 26, 2016 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Early autumn color comes to small aspen trees among Eastern Sierra Nevada boulders

There are many ways to “see” aspens, especially during the season when they briefly take on their transitional fall colors. Whole slopes filled with masses of their color are always an impressive sight. Larger views in which the aspens appear scattered within the landscape produce a different effect. The shapes of the white trunks might be the subject. We can move in close and focus on branches or even individual leaves. In some cases, the trees can act as a foil to other elements of the mountain landscape — conifer trees, the sky, flowing water. In this case, the color is, I think, a foil to the shapes, colors, and textures of granite boulders.

I made this photograph quite early in the Sierra color season, when the first trees were changing — somewhat earlier than usual this year, or so it seemed. While the largest trees were still nearly uniformly green, smaller trees and those growing in more marginal dry and rock areas were already taking on fall color. These trees are small, growing among rocks, and comprise just a few trees growing in an area that is mostly filled with conifers. In some ways, this makes their coloration even more striking than if they had been simply two trees among hundreds of aspens.

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

Photographs: Fall Color, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Sierra Nevada

Early Aspens, Sierra Dawn

September 20, 2016 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Sierra Nevada dawn and early season aspen color

If you want expansive views of the eastern escarpment of the Sierra Nevada, head east of the range and up into the mountains. The White Mountains are renowned for providing such views, but there are many other ranges, too, and you can get some idea where to look for them by driving along US 395 and asking the question: “I wonder what is over there?” I ask that question from time to time, and it led me to this spot back in July, at which time I decided to return when the aspen color began. To be honest, I wasn’t expecting quite so much color, this still being mid-September — but I was pleasantly surprised.

This section of the crest features the prominent summits of Mounts Ritter and Banner — though technically these peaks are west of the crest and the lower and closer ridge is the actual crest. Further to the left of these peaks a bit of the Minarets is visible. The aspens in the foreground are the sort that seem to change colors early — relatively small trees in very high places and growing in drier areas. But even these small trees can produce intense color, especially when many of them carpet the mountainside. As a side note, I was exceptionally lucky to visit this place on this particular day. By the next morning smoke from a wildfire along the Owens River had socked in the whole eastern Sierra, and the view from this spot would have been, well, no view at all!

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

Forest and Cliffs

September 17, 2016 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Yosemite forest, with many dead and dying trees, and cliffs near Bridal Veil fall

In early September, about a week after returning from over a month of international travel — and missing the entire month of August in the Sierra! — I finally got to “go home” to the Yosemite high country for a few days. I camped in Tuolumne Meadows, traveled briefly to the East Side along US 395, and returned home via quick stops in Yosemite Valley, Oakhurst, and a favorite winter bird spot in the Central Valley. It was a quick trip, but just enough to get me back in contact with the mountains. (It also let me take an early look at the upcoming seasonal changes. The signs of fall in the Sierra are clear: corn lily plants dying off and falling over, bilberry reddening meadow edges, little spots of yellow on plants high up on rocky slopes, a few golden willow leaves here and there, and a general sense that everything is slowing after summer’s frantic burst of life.)

I rarely visit Yosemite Valley in the summer, preferring almost any other time to the crowds that go there during the vacation season. Although this was a post-Labor Day visit, and the biggest crowds had departed, there were still lots of people there. After a visit to the Ansel Adams Gallery, where a show celebrating the role of photography in the parks was close to concluding (it included five of my prints), I started to head out of the Valley. As I passed this spot I caught a glimpse of drought-killed trees (with the help of bark beetles), other trees standing tall, and the cliffs around Bridal Veil fall. I noticed it too late to stop… so I took one more loop around the roads of the lower valley and came back to make this photograph in the afternoon light and haze.

G Dan Mitchell Photography

Tag Archives: trees

Autumn Evening, Eastern Sierra

Small Aspens, Boulders

Early Aspens, Sierra Dawn

Forest and Cliffs

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