The rains missed us last night and this afternoon but the upper reaches of the trails were still wet. I took a slightly different route up the mountain today to see if I might find some different flowers and sure enough, I was graced with some beauties.
The Starburst lives up to it’s name, especially when it’s back lit like this one. In two days of hiking and covering 13 miles of trail, I only saw two of these, and the one yesterday was shaded and did not turn out well.
The Nodding Onion, while pretty, did not turn out quite like I had hoped. I have another that I took in the Slideshows that I prefer and I was hoping to duplicate that effect. Perhaps next week.
Finally, out of the thousands of Stanley’s Four O’clock that were along the trail I saw this group with their petals in the shade and the yellow tips of the flower in the light.
This was only my third climb up the mountain since it reopened and the second attempt to see how my new (to me) camera would perform. Fortunately we have had plenty of rain these past weeks and the flowers have started to appear again on the mountain.
One would think that it is spring again on the mountain, especially with all of the Apache plume that is in bloom.
I can’t help myself when I come across a purple geranium, especially when it’s inhabited by a pollinator.
I’m giving the camera two thumbs up. After today’s session I’ve decided to retire my Olympus 5060 zoom as my hiking camera.
I’m adding this final image, not because it’s great, but because it’s great to see rain drops left on leaves long after the storm passed. The mountain is getting wet again and that’s good news.
I was working on a home improvement project Thursday evening when out of the corner of my eye I saw a flash of light. In my house however that’s not always what it appears since we have some kind of anti-hardshell bug repellers that emit a bright blue flash of light on a regular basis.
This time however, I saw the light in an area where it did not normally appear.
Thus began a three hour saga of storm and lightning that I will document over in the journal pages.
This year represents the 9th year of taking photos of lightning and in that time, I captured more images this night than I had in the last several years combined.
With the second hike in for the new post-drought season, I’ve taken a new camera to the mountain to see if it’s a “keeper” or whether I’ll simply return it to E-Bay from whence it came.
Although I didn’t get any time to look at the manual before starting the hike, I have a good feeling about it. More testing to come this weekend.
First I came upon a Tufted Geranium or the Purple wild Geranium
Shot in macro mode – using auto focus. Not until the last two images did I try the manual focus with the camera.
Columbine – with great back lighting.
I included the ant in this next image so you can see just how small the flowers are on the Stanley’s Four O’clock .
Next – Showy Goldeneye
Slideshows of New Mexico Wildflowers can be found on the slideshow pages.
This year fireworks are pretty much banned all around New Mexico, except for the public displays that are put on by various townships and cities. As we drove into Alamogordo last night we happened to catch a lot of the action since it was set up in the foothills above the city.
While hiking the next day, we found this riot of color right near the side of the road.
While wandering through another path in the woods I spotted this beauty, which is as of yet, unidentified. It’s about the size of half of a dime.
by David Alan
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