Desert Canyon Creek. Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument, Utah. October 24, 2014. © Copyright 2015 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Sky and sandstone reflect in the surface of a desert canyon creek

I can’t say that I’ve yet spent enough time in these Utah canyons to fully understand their cycles, but it seems to me that there must be an ongoing back-and-forth between forces that heap sand into them and the forces that move that sand away. Whether the canyons are dry or wet when I visit, the effects of water are evident everywhere. Low places hold it long after the flow has stopped, and they can be deep pools or bowls of mud. The passage of water is recorded in dry form in ripples in sand and desiccated mud. And when the creeks flow, their banks often have terraces cut into the deposited sand when the water was at varying depths.

This bit of creek bed was at the base of a short drop below a small cascade, and it must have collected sand during some period of greater flow. The water was flowing sedately and quietly when we were there, yet the evidence of its ability to cut into the bottom of the canyon is clearly visible. The light had a blue-purple coloration here under the overhand of a large cliff, and the golden reflections in the mud and water are from plants and sunlit cliff faces high above.

G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer and visual opportunist 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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