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Lichen Pinwheel
Bozeman, Montana
2023

A lupine leaf casting a windmill-like shadow on a patch of lichen.

Gone
Bozeman, Montana
2023

Flight of the Fearless
Bozeman, Montana
2023

I’m sure chickadees are actually afraid of any number of things, but me standing right next to the bird feeder when they’re coming in to feed is not one of them.

Waiting for Water
Bozeman, Montana
2023

Prior to them getting electricity and piped in water at my grandparent’s farm when I was a kid, I remember getting water in a bucket from a pump like this to carry into the house for use. That task seemed much more utilitarian than this quaint photo might suggest. So did the trips to the outhouse in the dark on a cold morning.

The Water Bearers
Bozeman, Montana
2023

A still life worthy of any garden.

The Home Place
Bozeman, Montana
2023

I know that homesteading in the west around the turn of the 20th was to a large degree anything but an idyllic endeavor. But still, this view from the entrance to the Museum of the Rockies Living History Farm made such a life look very peaceful and inviting.

(As an aside, the title for this image was a nod to the book by the same title by writer and photographer Wright Morris.)

The Hatch
Bozeman, Montana
2023

This dinosaur’s demise was way more premature than that of the species in general. I should mention that this photo and those of the last two days were of exhibits at the Museum of the Rockies in Bozeman.

The Usual Suspects
Bozeman, Montana
2023

A lineup of triceratops skulls showing an age progression from left to right.

Prehistoric Makeup
Bozeman, Montana
2023

Sometimes when they reconstruct dinosaur skeletons from partial fossils they try to match the plaster color for the missing pieces they are filling in to that of the actual fossils.  Other times, such as in this case, they use unadulterated plaster which creates a high contrast effect. I doubt that it was the intended purpose, but in this particular case the use of white plaster results in an interesting artistic mosaic of a terrifying “thunder lizard” that from an artistic point of view is quite a bit more interesting than a carefully color-matched effort. (Full disclosure, the darker parts of this reconstruction aren’t likely the real fossils, rather they are reproductions of the real fossils that are safely tucked away in storage somewhere.)

Horse Head
Maryhill Museum of Art, Washington
2023

Without proper context, or seeing the whole sculpture piece, this might not appear as a horse head at first glance. It is part of the sculpture “Winter Rider Variation” by James Lee Hansen. The entire sculpture is an interesting piece, but I found this head shot to be most compelling.