Tag Archives: trees

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

Wildfire Survivors, Morning

July 18, 2013 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Morning light on tall trees spared by a wildfire, Yosemite National Park

This is a sort of sad but hopeful portion of Yosemite. This valley, along the Tioga Pass Road, was badly burned back in the 1990s in a fire that burned upslope from the Foresta area and through old forest than had not burned in a long time. Back in the days of fire suppression, during the decades without fire a lot of undergrowth grew up and many fallen trees and other sorts of flammable debris collected. The result of Smokey Bear’s call to “prevent forest fires” was the creation of a very fuel rich forest environment and produced super-fires that were so hot that they not only consumed undergrowth but killed mature trees. This fire was one of those, and the forest in this valley near the upper reaches of the fire, just before it was halted at Tioga Pass Road, was almost completely decimated.

At first I found the sight to be depressing. Gradually I have come to regard fire as a normal part of forest ecology and can now see some stark beauty in its aftermath. However, this valley has remained a scar and a blunt reminder of why managing natural fires, along with other measures, makes for a better strategy. After a few years I began to think that there might be a photograph in this valley, though I stopped for several years without seeing anything that would work. I began to think that it might be good to try to photograph late in the day when area is open to the evening sky in the west – but I stopped a number of times and it just wasn’t right. However, on this trip I passed by early in the morning, just as the sun was topping a ridge to the east (left) and lighting up this small group of older trees that survived the original fire and now form a little outpost of forest against the desolate face of the far hillside.

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

Egret Quartet

July 16, 2013 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

A quartet of egrets on a foggy morning in a green late-winter pasture in California’s San Joaquin Valley.

This gang of egrets was politely waiting for me near the far corner of a wildlife refuge that I had visited on the last-winter morning, hoping to photograph (mostly) geese and cranes. The geese and cranes were a bit shy, and as I worked my way around the refuge’s perimeter road I wasn’t finding a lot of opportunities to photograph them. I could hear them, especially the sandhill cranes, but they seemed to be too far off, hidden by fog, or behind the tules. But I wasn’t in a hurry, so I took my time, stopping and watching and listening. By this later point in the season the initial astonishment at the huge numbers of birds had worn off a bit, and rather than jumping out of the car to photograph huge flocks of birds, as if they were the first and only flocks in the world, had given way to a bit more patience.

It had appeared that it would be a clear morning as I drove toward this location, but just moments before I arrived – a bit before dawn – the cool and damp air did begin to form some fog. This was fine with me, as I’d rather have a bit of interesting foggy atmosphere than have perfectly clear sky. But the fog was relatively short-lived – not like the midwinter fogs that can cover these places for days on end. By the time I finally worked my way over to this spot the sun was starting to break through and the fog was thinning. Because of their stark white color, lone egrets are often easy to spot from a good distance, and four of them clustered together were impossible to overlook. As I edged up closer to them, remaining in my vehicle so as not to spook them, they simply stood there, occasionally swinging their heads one way or another. Before I could make this photograph I first had to wait for an unruly band of red-winged blackbirds to depart, and then I waited for the four birds to move their heads in what seemed to me to be interesting directions.

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

Lake, Granite, and Forest Reflection

July 15, 2013 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Granite slabs rise above the reflected shoreline of Tenaya Lake, Yosemite National Park

I woke up on this morning in Yosemite Valley, car camping (as in “camping in the back of my car”) so that I could rise well before dawn, get out of the Valley, and drive over Tioga Pass in the morning light on this first weekend during which the road was open. It had actually opened the previous day, and I had made a ritual midday “first of the season” drive to the pass, but it was in light that was less than inspiring – hence my return at an earlier hour this next morning. It was dark when I left the Valley and the sky began to lighten as I headed up toward highway 120 and the trans-Sierra route.

I stopped along the way in the very early light to photograph lakes and rocks and trees and granite, and by the time I arrived at the shoreline of Tenaya Lake I felt like the light was going. However, the stillness of the water and the slight atmospheric recession produced by morning haze caught my attention and I pulled over. The main draw for me in this composition and a few other similar ones that I did at the same time was the reflection of the sunlit granite slabs ascending from the far shoreline. I also wanted to contrast that hard and bright surface with the softer and darker patterns of the forest beyond and the shaded faces above the forest.

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: The Southwest, Photographs: Utah

Cottonwoods, Meadow, and Stumps

July 11, 2013 G Dan Mitchell 2 Comments

Stumps of dead brush in a meadow with autumn cotton wood trees, Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument

We encountered these first autumn-foliage cottonwoods shortly after we entered this canyon, and this being our first day shooting in this area, I think we (or at least I) felt obligated to shoot every possible subject, since everything was so new on this day. Later I might have passed up these cottonwoods which, despite their brilliant color, were it a tricky spot to photograph and were just about to end up in the direct morning sunlight.

Trying to find some sort of composition that could include them but not make them the whole story, I first saw the brushy meadow with its light green grasses and older dry grass, but that was too featureless of a foreground for what I had in mind. Then I saw these old dead stumps of perhaps tamarisk or some other desert plant that were still standing in a section of this meadowy area, and I decide to use them to fill the foreground.

G Dan Mitchell Photography

Tag Archives: trees

Wildfire Survivors, Morning

Egret Quartet

Lake, Granite, and Forest Reflection

Cottonwoods, Meadow, and Stumps

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