Thursday, July 29, 2010

I Really be Likin' Lichen





OK, OK, I'm sorry, I know that my title is not original (borrowed from an advertisement), but it is clever, and expresses how I feel about lichen.

Lichen first entered my conscious when I was but a boy...the same time that many of the wonders of nature that I am particularly fond of did. Also, as with many of such wonders, lichen first latched onto my soul during a visit to Yosemite.

I can still recall walking through an evergreen forest with my parents and siblings. The delightfully calming aroma of pine needles filling the air; the ground a soft carpet of decomposing forest duff...pine needles, pine cones, pieces of wood and bark and, wait, what's this? An "abstract art" looking life form, an almost fluorescent toothpaste green. They're dotting the trees about us, but I spot one on the ground. Picking it up, I find that this one too, is clinging to bark, but this bit of bark has fallen to the ground. Showing it to my mom, I learn that this beautiful little object is called lichen.

There are 3 types of lichen: crustose grow very closely to the rock and have no leaves,
foliose have small leaves that grow up from the rock, and fruticose, which have little shoots growing up and often remind me of lilliputian forests, sometimes they hang off of trees and resemble spanish moss. This is my favorite type. There are between 18,000 - 25,000 species of lichen, depending on where you go for information. A new species of lichen (Altectoria sarmentosa) was found in Yosemite just a couple of years ago.

Lichen are beautiful, adding soft splashes of color - variety of color and texture to rock that often otherwise would be somewhat monotonous. When I see lichen I envision
the Creator daubing the landscape here and there with His paintbrush.

What is more, they are fascinating, an amazing design. They are a composite organism of fungus and algae. Fungi can't make food on their own. They usually get their nourishment from acting as either decomposers or as parasites. In this symbiotic relationship fungi provide the "skin", allowing algae to grow where it otherwise could not, and algae provide the food through photosynthesis. They rely on light, air and minerals as food source, most of the minerals coming from rainwater. They play an important role in the ecosystem, breaking down rock so that mosses, and later, larger plants can get a foothold.

There is so much more that could be said about lichen, but an in-depth article about lichen is beyond the scope of this blog (if you want to learn more, check out these links: concord.org, University of Vermont and Yahoo Education.)

Thursday, July 22, 2010

"Little boys are made of ....praying mantises"?



Why is it that little boys are so fascinated with plants and bugs that eat bugs? When I was young I was enthralled with Venus Flytraps (I even bought one once, and was very disappointed that it didn't "catch" any flies - even when I caught one and dropped it in its "mouth").

I was also fascinated with ladybugs, and even more so with Praying Mantises.

The Praying Mantis is an interesting insect. It has 5 eyes. The two large compound, prominent ones, and 3 "simple" eyes between them (you can make them out in the head shot. It can turn its' head 180 degrees and most commonly eats flies, moths, crickets, grasshoppers, etc.

The Praying Mantis catches its prey with its front legs, striking so quick that it really can't be seen with the naked eye. Their legs have spikes that assist in capturing their prey help enable them to turn their food (like eating corn on the cob:)).

During one of my filming trips to Yosemite Valley last year I spotted a praying mantis while shooting in one of the meadows. I desperately wanted to film the mantis for my DVD, but he/she was just too quick.

However, last week I found a mantis not far from my house, and took a few shots. They weren't around when I was growing up, but I see them every once in a while now. I had purchased a few mantis egg cases and put them in my garden in the mid '70's. Surely the population of mantises we have around here didn't all come from those few egg cases, did they?

Sunday, July 11, 2010

Of Blueberries and Waterfalls




What do blueberries and waterfalls have in common, you may ask?

I have a patch of blueberries that I planted 10 or 11 years ago. They produce enough to have them fresh for 6-8 weeks, leaving enough for freezer so that we enjoy blueberry pancakes and smoothies a few times a week for the rest of the year.

In a typical year they are done producing by late June. However, here it is mid July and today I was out in the patch picking blueberries for 3 hours. And there are quite a few still needing to get ripe. Why?

For the same reason that the waterfalls in Yosemite are more impressive now than they usually are in July: because of our above average snow pack (115%) and long, cold spring.

One of the more common questions I get from people planning a trip to Yosemite is, Will the waterfalls still be impressive in [then they give a date they are planning on coming]? As this years waterfalls show, how long they are going to be flowing strong is impossible to predict. Several factors are involved, such as snow pack and how quickly it warms up.

I tell people that if it's important to them that the waterfalls are going strong when they get to Yosemite they should come in May or early June. Come then and you are practically guaranteed fine waterfall displays.

But the blueberries are at my house :)

Friday, July 9, 2010

An Olmsted Point Sunset


Photography is a demanding art form. If you're into stamp collecting, painting, playing the violin or just about anything else, your passion is at your command. You engage in it when you want, and when you're tired, you stop. Not so with photography.

I had spent a long day at Tuolumne Meadows. I had enjoyed a full day of hiking in the wind and cold; bundled up my jacket as the hail began to fall. This added weather meant for some interesting shooting.

But now it was time to go home. I was happy and feeling at peace, but very tired.

As I began my 3 hour drive home I thought about whether I would stop at Olmsted Point (my favorite Tioga Rd pullout) when I got to it. No, I was very tired, I really wanted to get home. But then, as the road wound its way up toward the point, I noticed that the granite yet caressed by the setting sun was unusually orange and vibrant. The last thing I felt like doing was digging my camera and lenses out, but, like all photographers, I am a slave to that master, light. I couldn't bear the thought that this wonderful moment - the fading suns brief affair with the sierra landscape, this brilliant alpenglow - would escape my cameras lens.

Shortly I reached Olmsted Pt, hopped out of my car while grabbing my camera and had time to take just two images (this one looking toward Half Dome) before the brilliant orange and yellows turned gray.

Thursday, July 1, 2010

The Best Water Show in Town







So here I was - having just gotten back from a week in Yellowstone, consumed with the need to get to Yosemite. Why?

Yosemite is like home, and I felt a great need to see it. But what is more, while in Yellowstone I didn't have the opportunity to take any "Walkabouts", just short hikes of up to 7 miles. I felt the need to push my body.

But where to go? Yosemite Valley is notoriously busy in summer. Campfires turn the valley into a smoke-filled hell, the Valley's beautiful views ruined.

My preferred jump-off point in summer is Tuolumne Meadows. At about 9,000' elevation the snow is deeper and melts later than in the valley. Fewer people visit Tuolumne Meadows, making for a more laid-back experience.

This year we had been blessed with extra snow and a long, cool spring, which meant that rivers and waterfalls would be just about peaking in Tuolumne Meadows. My favorite water show here is the 18 mile round trip hike to LeConte Falls. This routes first 5 miles are relatively level - winding through granite bedrock, coniferous forests, and wide meadows dissected by the lazy (at this point) Tuolumne River. The final 4.5 miles drops 2,500', here the Tuolumne is anything but lazy as it changes - first to roaring river, then cascade, to waterfall - back again to cascade...and so on, an ongoing shuffling of water display that never fails to take your breath away.

Yes, with lots of melting snow and trails just opening up this would be the pick.

I got up at 3:00 a.m., had a big breakfast, packed my day pack and left, getting to the trail head at 7:00 a.m. It was a bright blue, cloudless day. Expecting swollen rivers, I brought my hiking poles and waterproof boots.

It was a good thing I did. Delaney Creek (which I usually wade through in fall) was raging. There was a sturdy log conveniently located that allowed for crossing. Other streams weren't as endowed however, and my boots and poles came in very handy, making it possible to use partially submerged rocks as "bridges".

It would seem that the extra heavy snow year had kept some people away, because I found uncommon solitude on this popular trail, encountering only 4 people during the 6 miles from Tuolumne Meadows to Glen Aulin High Sierra Camp, and no one from there to LeConte Falls. Though I knew that the river and falls would be more impressive than usual, I really wasn't prepared for the incredible roar of the water, its thunder reverberating through my body. Here I was, enjoying some of the best scenery on earth, prime time, and in solitude. Money can't buy anything better.

Topping out of Glen Aulin, I look down the Grand Canyon of the Tuolumne, the beauty so surreal, so perfect, I find that I can't hold back the tears. This, to me, rivals Yosemite Valley, certainly Little Yosemite Valley, and yet relatively few Yosemite visitors even know that it exists.

On the way to LeConte I pass California Falls and quite a few cascades and other falls. It's after 1:00 p.m. and I have to be back to my car by 8:00 to drop off some DVDs at the Evergreen Lodge store, so I pick up my pace and run to Waterwheel Falls.

LeConte is fascinating. The cascading, roaring water hits "pockets" in the sheer granite and shoots back up, making for a festive, happy water show.

After enjoying a late lunch I head back, running. About 3 miles from my car I enter a clearing next to the lazy Tuolumne and surprise a couple skinny-dipping on the other side of the clearing, right next to the trail. I turn my back long enough for them to get their clothes back on, then continue and get to my car by 7:00 p.m.; dog-tired and very hungry, but refreshed and satisfied. A hamburger and coffee at Bucks Meadow makes the perfect end of a fine day.

Credit: I had long mistaken LeConte for Waterwheel Falls. I want to thank bill-e-g and qumqats on the YosemiteNews forum for enlightening me.

P.S. The first few seconds of the video clip shows one of the many falls along my route, then fades to a pan of LeConte Falls.