Category Archives: Photographs: Northern California

Photographs from Northern California

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

Geese, Central Valley Haze

February 7, 2013 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

A huge flock of Ross’s geese flies in front of a clump of trees and above the marsh in hazy afternoon light, Joaquin Valley, California

If nothing else, this was a day of interesting and varied atmosphere and light. The day began if fog so thick we could barely see and ended with an amazing and unexpected display of color as the underside of the clouds of an approaching weather system lit up just at sunset. In between we had fog of varying thicknesses, occasional breaks of sun, and eventually the sort of luminous haze that often is found in the Central Valley at this time of year. And throughout the day we had the Ross’s geese – in big flock on the ground, passing groups of a few individuals, and the periodic eruptions into flight by entire flocks.

In the afternoon, after the densest fog had cleared, we found ourselves back at the observations platform near the entrance to the refuge, perhaps a bit tired after several hours of steady shooting. To our west was a large pond and the bright backlit valley haze had drained most of the color from the scene. Soon the flocks that we had been photographing near a pasture behind us and to the east began to lift off and fly around our position and out over the pond. I tracked the massive cloud of birds and attempted to photograph them as they appeared in front of various background landscape features. Here they are above the pond and in front of a cluster of trees, with the pale, hazy atmosphere beyond.

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

The Cranes Return, Evening

February 5, 2013 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

The sandhill cranes return to the marshes of the San Joaquin Valley at dusk on a mid-winter evening.

For reasons I can’t quite put my finger on, the evening return of the sandhill cranes is one of the magical things among a host of magical things about central California’s winter migratory bird population. I think I was primed to regard these birds this way by reading about them many years ago, though I never quite new what sandhill cranes actually were and I presumed that they were only found in far-off places. Then when I first began to photograph birds seriously – which was only a few years ago – one of my first encounters with the winter bird popular involved finding sandhill cranes in fields south of Sacramento. Then, perhaps last winter, there was an evening at a wildlife refuge in the Central Valley when I was photographing geese with a small group of friends. There had been many, many Ross’s geese around that evening and as dusk approached the goose photography gradually came to an end as the geese departed. After the intense focus of shooting those birds, once they were gone we sort of looked up and realized that the sun was gone and that the world was quieting down. It seemed like the show was over. And then I heard a sound from over the trees to the southeast, a sound I now immediately recognize as the distinctive call of the cranes, and within moments huge flocks of these birds began to coast overhead and look for landing spots.

That is now how I expect to see them – at some point during the dusk period when most everything else has started to quiet down, the cranes appear. Their sound is a distinct contrast with the wild and raucous cackling of the geese, an altogether calmer and quieter call. And their mode of flight is also different. While the geese often launch loudly into the sky in huge, flapping clouds, the cranes coast in slowly and rather quietly, often in long lines, and their motion is slower and smoother. On this evening, at a point when there was barely enough light left to make photographs, they appeared to my left and crossed in front of me with the western dusk sky as a backdrop.

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Northern California

Winter Fog, Ridges

February 3, 2013 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Winter fog wraps around the lower slopes of Marin County mountains along the Pacific coast north of San Francisco

This was the sort of day of photography that I have learned to accept as something that comes with the territory. I was up hours before dawn, and on the road shortly after that, with an idea of photographing in the redwoods of Marin County north of the Golden Gate, or perhaps of photographing along the coast where high surf was predicted. As I got on the road I noticed that there was some fog about, which is fine as I often like photographing in such conditions. Nearly an hour later as the time of sunrise approached, I noticed that the day was not becoming light very fast and, in fact, things were looking quite gray. I crossed the Golden Gate in fog, stopped briefly on the north side of the bridge, and wasn’t able to see much of anything. I continued on to the Muir Woods area and parked. As I sat in the car, it became clear that there wasn’t going to be much in the way of compelling light here, either. (I’m not one to insist on incredible light, so when I say that the light wasn’t promising… I mean it!) I soon decided to leave and go up the coast a ways. As I drove I figured out that the murky light was the result of a combination of thick coastal fog, generally hazy conditions where it wasn’t foggy, and above it all the high clouds of a passing weather front.

While finding myself in conditions like these doesn’t exactly make me happy – who wouldn’t prefer beautiful light and easy subjects!? – I don’t get upset about it any more. In order to find really special subjects and light one must simply go “out there” a lot to increase the odds. Special things are special at least partially because they are not ordinary, and we cannot expect stupendous conditions on every outing. I shoot enough to have had the good fortune to almost regularly encounter truly wonderful conditions and to have some idea how to work with conditions that are merely good. But along with this good, I also have to accept the possibility – certainty, actually – that there will be some days when it seems like nothing happens. This was one of those days. I enjoyed being out and about, and I explored a few places that I had not visited before. I gave up on some ideas, tried others, and when the light was clearly not going to be good in the forest, I headed for the coast. When that didn’t work, I headed into the hills. It was what it was! Eventually, I ended up at the Mount Tamalpais State Park high in the Marin hills, and around one bend in the road the view opened to the west and I could see the ocean of fog bumping up against ridges below me and stretching on out over the ocean – so I stopped and made the only photographs of the day that worked. It wasn’t a great day… but it was still a good day!

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

White Pelican Flock

February 2, 2013 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

A flock of white pelicans settles on an island in the San Joaquin Valley, California

It probably should be a bit embarrassing to admit that there is a lot I don’t know about birds and other kinds of wildlife, but at least I continue to get the joy of learning new things because of that! I’ve been a fan of the coastal California pelicans for some time, often photographing them along the Pacific shoreline. I’ve learned a bit about their habits, to the point that I know some particular places and conditions in which I’m likely to find them, and I’ve built a bit of a collection of photographs of these birds. But I did not know that I would find pelicans at this Central Valley location, much less that they would yet a different sort of pelican than I have known about from the coast.

On this early December morning it was tremendously foggy when we arrived. We figured it would clear – eventually – but at first it was just about impossible to find birds to photograph since the distance that they wanted to keep between themselves and curious photographers seemed to be just about equal to the limits of visibility in the fog. We could hear birds, but were barely able to see them. At one point we stopped for a moment to roll down the windows and listen and I looked up to see a completely silent flock of large birds briefly though faintly overhead as they flew through the fog. I couldn’t figure out what they were, though I recall thinking that they were pelican-like. Some time later, perhaps hours, another member of our group asked if I had seen the pelicans, and it all came together. They had spotted “white pelicans” (which I didn’t know about) in very nearly the same spot where I had seen this flock fly past. So, on a later pass around the refuge perimeter road I was watching out for them, and they turned out to be easy to see in the clearer air and better light.

G Dan Mitchell Photography

Category Archives: Photographs: Northern California

Geese, Central Valley Haze

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The Cranes Return, Evening

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Winter Fog, Ridges

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

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