December 2021

Lone Pine
Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming
2021

Bare Tree #77
Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming
2021

A weathered juniper snag rests quietly in the shallows of the Gardner River.

Missing You Already
Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming
2021

The landscape around here has been painted with a pretty drab looking pallet of browns and dark green colors for the last month or so. With the snow the last few days, it’s now turned to a monochrome white, but I’m already nostalgic for the lovely colors of fall we had all around us just back in October.

Field Studies #6
Bozeman, Montana
2021

The Nature Preserve, owned by the nearby hospital, will presumably last long into the future. Not so I don’t think for the wheat fields surrounding much of it and currently serving as a nice buffer. One day in the near future I imagine these fields will be filled with housing or commercial developments. That will make the small preserve seem even smaller and more closed in, not to mention much more busy. It will lose most of it’s rural feel and become much more like a city park; while it will still be a nice place to visit but not with the same ambiance.

Field Studies #5
Bozeman, Montana
2021

At one end of the nature preserve, lying on private property, is an old homestead. The buildings are largely abandoned but the corrals are still used occasionally by the farmer/rancher who runs a small herd of cattle on the preserve during the summer. It looks well isolated but in fact is being encroached on by development on three sides.

Field Studies #4
Bozeman, Montana
2021

Field Studies #3
Bozeman, Montana
2021

Field Studies #2
Bozeman, Montana
2021

Field Studies #1
Bozeman, Montana
2021

One of my regular walking routes from our house in Bozeman takes me to a nature preserve that is surrounded mostly by wheat fields. The preserve itself is the main attraction to me but the surrounding fields have their appeal as well. I’ve posted photographs of some of the resident fence posts before, so this and the next couple of posts may look familiar to a degree. But revisiting the same subject in different, light, from a different angle, and/or a different frame of mind is a useful exercise for photographers. Some results may look essentially the same as previous images while others quite a bit different.

Views From the Pond #35
Bozeman, Montana
2021

A wider view of the upper pond.