Photographer in Colorado

Two weekends ago, I headed out to the Gunnison area to view the fall colors. The route to Gunnison passes by the Taylor Reservoir. I often stop here to take in the scenery before driving along the Taylor River. This year, the aspen on the far hillside had just peaked.

After setting up the tent side, I headed towards one of my favorite locations — Ohio Pass and Ohio Creek. A storm had just started to build along the West Elk Mountains.

The journey up Ohio Pass winds through the Aspen Forests. Rounding a bend, I was struck by the colors of the aspen tree straight ahead. Most aspen turn from green to yellow before the leaves fall. However, there are some trees that turn from yellow to orange or even red. This tree had all the colors.

Near the top of the pass, the forest opened up to reveal the valley walls. There were fiery patches of color from aspen and gambel oaks.

During this trip, the forests had a range of colors that included green and small patches of yellow. As autumn progresses, the green turns yellow before the leaves finally drop. Often high winds can strip leaves as soon as they yellow. Fortunately, this had not happened in this location.

Last weekend, I made a second trip to the mountains. This time I decided to explore a route along the West Elk Mountains. Driving along dirt roads through sage brush, the road passed by an aspen forest. At this location, the sage brush was adorned in fall colors.

After making several images, I found a gap in the forest, where there were deep shadows below the tree canopy. This created a sharp contrast of the pale sage brush against the background shadows.

Further along the dirt road, the aspen had fallen to create a yellow carpet on the road.

More to come. Stay tuned!

Early July is a great time for wildflowers in the mountains. This year I headed to the Gunnison and Created Butte area where I spent 3 days among the wildflowers. There was quite a bit of of smoke in the air from all the wildflowers burning in the western states.The flowers at Crested Butte were really spectacular. I don’t remember see the Corn Lily landscapes like this year. Heading towards Gothic, I captured this image of the Corn Lilies. Early in the season, these lilies have bright green leaves. After flowering, the leaves turn brown before the plants die off. Some of the plants in the foreground have started showing brown leaves.

Cow Parsnip is another plant that was abundant.

The morning after arriving at the campsite in Gunnison, I headed out west along the Gunnison River. The sky was thick with orange smoke from the wildfires. I headed down to the rocks along the shoreline, where I included a reflection of the sun in the water.

Returning back to Gunnison, I headed to an area that I had not visited for a few years. At certain locations around Gunnison, there are outcrops of breccia towering above the sage brush.

One of my favorite roads to Crested Butte is the road through Ohio Pass. I made several images of the wildflowers at the base of the pass. Here I found a clump of White Geraniums. I believe that these are Richardson Geraniums.

While spending lunch time under the aspen trees below Kebler Pass, I was surrounded by corn lilies. I made a macro soft focus image of the corn lily flowers; this image was made with a Lensbaby Velvet. At wide apertures, this gives a very soft focus, ideal for flowers!

Later in the afternoon, I was back on the road from Crested Butte to Gothic. I walked up a hillside covered with corn lilies. I like this backlit image of the corn lilies against a dark background of a pine forest. Among the lilies were occasional fireweeds; those are the pink/purple flowers at the bottom left.

Here is another image of the corn lilies on the hillside, bounded by forest of aspen and pine trees.

One of my favorite plants is the Green Gentian. They are not as prolific as some of the other plants, so I don’t always get to see them. These plants typically grow to 6 feet in height. I did find a few dozen plants along the roadside.

In this image, I found one plant with yellow daisies stretching out into the distance.

After arriving back at Mount Crested Butte, I was waiting for the sun to drop below the clouds. Looking up, I found blue sky with sunbeams shining through — the smoky air probably contributed to the spectacular sunbeams on that afternoon.

At Mount Crested Butte, there is one location where the hillside was covered with yellow daisies. In the distance the sun lit up the mountains among the smoke-filled air. However, I had to wait until the sun dropped below the clouds so that it would light up the valley below and the flowers in the foreground.

The following morning, I made my way along the north canyon drive from Gunnison to Crawford. Along the way, I found several locations where fireweed were growing along the roadside.

I made my way to the town of Paonia before heading back through Crested Butte and returning home that evening.

This year we had a record number of irises flowering in the garden. Before budding started, I estimated that there were over 40 plants that would flower — I stopped counting stalks at 29. For a couple of weeks every year, near the end of May, these flowers create a welcome addition to out garden in spring.

It is always difficult to make images of irises, especially macro shots like these. I like to get the “beard” in focus. However, it is easy to miss focus, especially when a breeze is present. Also, the depth of field at close focus is really narrow, so the entire beard cannot be sharp.

Iris buds are really interesting to photograph, before the flower emerges. There are greens, oranges and yellows with plenty of details in the veins. In this image there is a hint of the color of the flower — a deep blue/purple in this example.

This year, flower stalks from two adjacent plants were really close. I made this image of the pair flowers the day before both flowers opened — almost symmetrical!

Iris stalks typically have several flowers — one or more at the tip and several growing out of the stalk lower down. In this image, this plant had two flowers, one at tip and the second just behind, lower down on the stalk.

The iris leaves also make for some interesting images. In this image, we just have a forest of leaves! Each leaf seems to have an edge that is a paler yellow/green color that the rest of the leaf.

I made a second image, that I rendered as a monochrome black and white image. Here one can see the pale edges of the leaves.

Recently, I made a few images with the Lensbaby Velvet lens. At wide apertures, the iris flower has a soft focus glow that is very pleasing.

All our iris flowers have now willowed away. Every year, it becomes a challenge to make some interesting images of these wonderful plants.

A couple of weeks ago, I heard that a whole lot of birds had returned, or passed through, during the Spring migration. So I decided to head out to Cherry Creek State Park. soon after arriving, I walked along the shoreline and was able to get reasonably close to the birds. The first birds that were encountered was this pair of California Gulls. Even, though I had seen these gulls before, this was the first time I attempted to capture an image.

One of the next shorebirds that I had not seen before was the Greater Yellowlegs. There were several birds in the vicinity, but I did not need to wait long until they came in front of me.

Here this bird is just taking a walk through the water.

This bird is distinctive with those big yellow legs.

I had heard that several Avocets had arrived at Cherry Creek — this was the hook that caused me to visit. I had made some images of Avocet in a previous year. But this time there were a dozen or more at this location at Cherry Creek. I like this image because I managed to capture a frame with the open bill.

There were some small still pools close to the shore. As the Avocet was working along the shore line, I manged to capture a couple of images that included a reflection of the Avocet in the still water.

Here is the another image.

Finally, along came three yellowlegs, walking through the deeper water. The earlier images were of single birds. This was the first time that a group of birds approached me.

After leaving the shoreline, I hiked along one of the trials. Often I get to see Magpies — I used to see them every day walking to work. However, this time managed to capture an image of a Magpie as it was perched on a cat-tail.

A few minutes later, I noticed that a Coyote was walking through the long grass, but it was too far away.

A few weekends ago, I was rode along the Platte River bike path. When passing the Overland Pond, several Cormorants were perched on logs around the pond. After completing the bike ride, I returned with camera. By this time, only one Cormorant remained. This bird was perched on a log close to the center of the pond.

I spent about hour at the edge of the pond, making several images. This cormorant has a striking orange chin.

While perched, the cormorant pooped several times. Often birds will poop before taking flight. However, this time the bird remained on the perch.

This is a Double-Crested Cormorant. These birds have two crests, that look like long eye brows. In the image above, these “crests” are really visible when looking away.

Wow. How wide can bird open its mouth! They swallow fish whole.

Looking carefully, these cormorants have blue eyes. However, this was the first time that I noticed the the inside of their mouth is also blue.

Cormorants often drape their wings while perched out of water. They spend much time swimming on or below water; they spread their wings to allow water to drip off before taking flight.

In the above image, the bird made some unusual poses. I’m not sure what the above pose is about; there were no other cormorants in the vicinity. After spending an hour or so, the cormorant had left the perch and continued swim around the pond. On the other side of the pond, three Painted Turtles were perched on a log.

This was the first time that I had seen these turtles. I moved around to alter the angle of the log to a diagonal.

Finally, just before leaving the pond, one squirrel had found something to munch. He had been sitting on a knob of the tree, eating in the the afternoon sunlight.

Soon after making this image, the cormorant took flight and left the area.

The second morning in Monte Vista, we made sure to arrive at the ponds in the wildlife refuge well before sunrise. I made this image just before the sun rose.

During this visit, I attempted to make several images of cranes in flight. I managed to track this single crane from the time that it left the water.

I made several images of this crane. In the following image, the rising sun lit up the underside of the wings.

We spent more time at the ponds later in the morning to watch the coots and other birds. Periodically, the coots started chasing one another across the water. Perhaps this was a territorial dispute? Or a courting ritual? As they scoot across the water, the coots leave a trail of water spray behind them.

The calls of the Red-Winged Blackbirds rang out across the ponds. In this image, four males were perched in a nearby tree.

The ponds are lined with plenty of cat tails, so I had to make some images and included here.

The Red-Winged Blackbirds typically perch on cat tails. From here they make their distinctive calls. Most of the birds were males; the female birds had not arrived at the ponds.

Here is another image of the sunrise above the ponds. Luckily there were Canada Geese flying past at the same time.

The sun was obscured by clouds soon after this. There was less light when the last of the cranes flew out. This required a slower shutter speed that blurred the movement of the flying birds.

We made our way back to the hotel, checked out, and headed back home after a welcome break.

A couple of weeks ago, we spent a few days in Monte Vista to do some birding in the National Wildlife Refuge. It was great to go out to this great location. This was the last location where I stayed a few nights just before the Covid lockdown started!

Soon after arrival, we spent a few hours near one of the ponds in the wildlife refuge. This muskrat was spotted swimming up one of the channels adjacent to the main pond.

We counted about a dozen Cinnamon Teals, mostly male, farther down the channel. I managed to capture this male bird as he was spreading wings.

There were two mating pairs swimming along the same channel. In this image, the female was swimming ahead of the male.

Soon the male came into view…

This was a great location to capture these teal ducks. We were really lucky to get really close, capturing some great images as well.

The following morning we headed back to the ponds just before sunrise. The Sandhill Cranes were bathed in the dawn sunlight. This pond was a location where the cranes often spent the night to avoid predators.

In the distance, water had frozen during the night. But in the foreground, the cranes were contemplating flying out for the day.

Occasional birds and groups of birds slowly took off to reach the daytime feeding grounds. I managed to make several images of this crane as it left for the day.

In this image, one of the cranes was spreading its wings. Again I made several images until the crane had retracted its wings.

This was the first time that we had spent a night in a hotel for over a year. Also, we got to have dinner in a restaurant, practicing safe distancing.