This first image was taken by the crew of Apollo 8 on Christmas Eve in 1968 as they entered the orbit of the moon. It is called Earthrise. I display it here courtesy of NASA. Its significance is that it juxtaposes the moon and the earth against the blackness of space. It shows just how tiny and isolated our “big blue marble” is relative to our nearby universe.

On 09-15-2006, the Cassini spacecraft out past Jupiter took this picture of “home”. This view was provided by the Cassini Huygens project between NASA, the European Space Agency, and the Italian Space Agency. (Thank you, NASA/JPL/ and the Space Science Institute) The spacecraft was about a billion miles from home when this shot was taken. Our “big, blue, marble” is no more than a pinpoint on the left side of the image where it appears through the rings of Saturn.

The third image shows earth in a view from beneath Saturn taken by the Cassini craft on 7-19-2013. This shows Mother Earth shot from beneath the rings of Saturn. Earth is 898 million miles away. (Once more, thank you, NASA/JPL/ and the Space Science Institute)

I have left out the Pale Blue Dot image taken in 1990 by Voyager 1 as it left our solar system at 3.76 billion miles from home. I recommend that you visit Wikipedia to see the image and their article; and especially, to read the words of Carl Sagan regarding this image and man’s place in the universe.

The fourth image is the Hubble Ultra Deep Field 2014 image which is a composite of separate exposures taken from 2002 to 2012 with Hubble’s Advanced Camera for Surveys and Wide Field Camera 3. It is a composite of a small, but hugely distant part of our universe (5 to 10 billion light-years away). Each of the spots or shapes in the images are galaxies. The milky way of which we are a part is a galaxy. (Thank you, NASA, ESA, H. Teplitz and M. Rafelski (IPAC/Caltech), A. Koekemoer (STScI), R. Windhorst (Arizona State University), and Z. Levay (STScI) ) Note: that a light year is the distance light travels in a year’s time which is 5,879,000,000,000 miles (5.88 trillion). Multiply that number by 5 or 10 billion years, and you will have the distance in miles to the galaxies in the photo in miles which is between 29,395,000,000,000,000,000,000 miles and 58,790,000,000,000,000,000,000 miles from earth.

I have included these images to give you some perspective on this place we call our universe and where our earth resides in all of this. Need I say, that the universe is a HUGE place and we, with all our wants, needs, and desires are but a miniscule part of it all.

As far as we know, currently, earth is the only place in all the vastness of space where life occurs. Ponder that for a moment.

We as a species, as far as we know presently, are the only living things that have managed to create technology to allow us to explore beyond the confines of earth.

By the same token, we have at our disposal the means to vastly alter parts of our planet and create changes that could lead to our extinction as well as the extinction of many other living things on our planet.

One thing we do know, our planet is dynamic and it exists within a dynamic solar system and universe. We have lots of evidence that nothing stays the same over long spans of time.

Since we do not fully understand the consequences of our actions, I would advocate acting in ways that promote the reasoned use of our planetary resources with an eye towards preserving the variety of life on earth. Cost versus benefit is a ludicrous standard to measure the worth of the genetic heritage contained in each and every species on earth. Failure to conserve species diversity means an end to “undesirable” species by extinction which could ultimately mean our own demise.

Until we move out into the solar system, we live on a planet with finite resources. Wise use does not mean infinite expansion of our species’ numbers and economies needed to support those populations. Nor, does the unrestricted exploitation of “our planet” for personal gain promote our ultimate survival.

I like clean air, clean water, and freedom from pollution that can affect my health and longevity. I am opposed to those who burden the rest of us and our planet with practices that create pollution, health hazards, and ecological harm in order to increase their profit margins. I long for the days when we value what each citizen on our planet can contribute to the well being of themselves, others, and our planet rather than piling up meaningless sums and perversions of power to the detriment of all.

So call me a tree-hugger, an environmentalist, or whatever buzzword you wish. What is inescapable is that we live in a universe and on a planet that we should be striving, more than we do, to understand and learn better ways of coping with natural and self-inflicted hazards. To fail at these tasks, means we cease to exist. The universe will continue on its way like it has for the last 14 billion years. The question that faces our species, is will we be there, too?

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The head waters of the Cache la Poudre River are in Rocky Mountain National Park and it winds its way along 126 miles of scenic beauty to join the South Platte River near Greeley, Colorado. You can climb the mountains along this river on a scenic drive out of Fort Collins along state highway 14.

The formation of what we call the Rocky Mountains is a long complex tale of mountain building, erosion, innundation, and subsequent mountain building (orogeny). The rocks that form the walls of the Cache La Poudre canyon are metamorphic gneiss made from Precambrian age granites of the Ancestral Rocky Mountains which were heated and compressed during the Laramide Orogeny between 80-55 million years ago.

The gneissic banding seen in this photo is not only beautiful but tells the story of heat an compression experienced by these ancient granites on their way to becoming the metamorphic gneiss seen here.

In this image the foliation or layering of the gneiss is visible. The immense pressure and high temperature experienced by the granite while metamorphosing into gneiss is what produced the sculpture you see.

From the size of the rocks in the Cache La Poudre river bed and along the bank in the foreground, you can tell that large amounts of water moving rapidly through this area in the past pushed these heavy monsters down stream.

Scenes like this are why the Cache La Poudre River has been designated a national scenic river.

This is and example of Bird’s Foot Trefoil Lotus corniculatus from the pea family Fabaceae. This plant is both a native and an introduced species to all parts of the US and Canada. It is widely used for hay to feed livestock and serves as a food source for deer, elk, geese, ducks, and pheasants.

This is an example of the Rubber Rabbit Brush (Ericameria nauseosa)
This plant reminds me of Prairie Broomweed (Amphiachyris dracunculoides) that grows all around where I live. Rubber Rabbit Brush will be eaten to a limited extent by livestock but it is valuable to wildlife during the winter.

This is a closeup of the flower head of the Rubber Rabbit Brush. This plant is part of the Daisy family (Asteraceae) but has flowers that do not make you think Daisy flower at all.

In the last image, you see an example of Western Aster (Symphyotrichum ascendens) another member of the Asteraceae family which produces beautiful, tiny lavender flowers with yellow disk florets. The USDA says that this plant is sometimes mixed in with other seed types to help stabilize disturbed or damaged soils. Beautiful as well as useful.

All these sights and creatures can be seen and enjoyed on a short day’s drive up the Cache La Poudre River Canyon just west of Fort Collins, Colorado on state 14. Worth the trip, and good for your soul.

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On a recent trip to Rocky Mountain National Park near Fort Collins Colorado, I was able to make some photographs of the incredible mountains that can be seen along US 34. In this image looking down Forest Canyon, you can see this valley has been cut by glaciers and eroded by the Thompson River that runs along the canyon floor. In the foreground, you can see the wall of the canyon is covered with the glacial till (silt, sand, gravel, and boulders) deposited as a lateral moraine by the glaciers that ground this valley out of these granite mountains.

In the foreground of this image, you can see some impressively large chunks of granite that were carried along by the glaciers as they eroded the walls of Forest Canyon. The soil in this image is covered by grasses which are a fundamental part of this alpine ecosystem at 12,718 feet above sea level. You can read more about the yellow-bellied Marmot and the various ground squirrels found in this part of the park thanks to the National Park Service’s web pages here and here. A complete list of the animal species in the park can be found here.

In this final image, you can see Lichens on the rocks in the foreground. These organisms are found in environments that are too extreme for many other organisms. The high elevation and the weather restrict the kinds of plants and animals that can live here.

Lichens are symbiotic organisms formed by a fungus and and an algae living together as a single organism. The algae grow within the fungus and the fungal cells consume the algal cells. The fungus provides the minerals and water to support the algae’s growth while the algae reproduce fast enough to feed the fungus. This is an example of what biologists call mutualism. Each species gets positive things from the other so they do better together than apart.

Lichens are often overlooked and ignored, but they are incredibly important to the harsh or difficult ecosystems where they occur.
The lichens of this ecosystem erode the rocks and help form the soil used by the grasses and other plants that grow here.

You can read more about lichens here, and in Douglas Ahl’s master’s thesis from 2011 at the University of Colorado.

(NOTE: You can read the pdf file at this location:

http://digital.auraria.edu/content/AA/00/00/59/33/00001/Ahl_ucdenver_0765N_10786.pdf

Since this is on a insecure http server, I have not put this url in this page as a clickable link for security reasons. I have provided a link you can copy and place into your browser bar, if you choose to accept this document from a non https server)

Ahl identified over 19 species of lichen that are prevalent in this region of the Rocky Mountains. There are photographs in the appendices of his work that are worth a look for anyone unfamiliar with these organisms. His research is part of an ongoing study of lichens as indicator species for the health and changes within this high altitude ecosystem.

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I live in an interesting part of Texas. We are on the edge of the Great Plains escarpment, known locally as the caprock. The caprock is great farmland, miles and miles of flat land. Pictured here is a winter wheat field. Cotton is king in these parts, but folks also grow corn, pumpkins, canola, and hay. Beef production is a big part of the economy around here too.

This image is looking north from a place just west of my town. The elevation up on the caprock is about 3133 above sea level and drops to 2450 feet near Matador and declines even further as you go east and south from here.

This image shows an exposed piece of the caprock on the center right. In the center left the dark green is the bottom of the canyon. Between there and the top of the canyon is over 600 feet of elevation change. The caprock is part of the Ogallala formation which is about 10 million years old. The rocks at the bottom of the canyon are Permian age rocks that were deposited some 298 to 250 million years ago.

Erosional forces have been at work all this time to produce the terrain we see today. Ice during the winter can cause stones and soil particles to loosen, which opens the way for water or wind to move them.

As you can see, this country is rough along the edges of the caprock also known as the Great plains Escarpment(seen here at the horizon).

Our semi-arid climate while great for growing cotton, is sometimes prone to large thunderstorms.

We have many creeks and rivers that run through this part of the world. They are what geologists call intermittent streams. They may be dry one day and full of water the next. This is a picture of the North Pease River on a day it had water flowing. The Pease has 3 branches in our area.

Here is a shot of the Little Red River. A lot of water can flow through here when needed. It is dry most of the year. The cliff on the left of the picture shows strata that were deposited during Permian times. A lot of rock and soil from these formations have washed down this river.

This is an example of a washed out county road. The surface of this dirt road had been coated with some black-top here to protect it from erosion by rain water. The land here is very sandy and the runoff from the surrounding fields comes through here and empties into a creek about 10 feet below the road surface. As you can see, the drainage from a heavy rainstorm cut back into the soil and undermined the road. This is an example of the kinds of erosional forces at work which have produced the terrain we see today.

This is what water running down a sandy hillside can do to the surface of the soil.

Compare the ripples in the Permian age mudstone pictured here to the previous image. It is one of the ways that geologists try to explain what they see in the rocks they study. We have a current example of how running water can shape the surface of soils and and ancient example of the same kind of behavior. So, it is possible to infer that the ancient example was created in a similar fashion.

Here is another example of how powerful moving water can be. In the center of the photo are large chunks of limestone that have been eroded from the hills upstream and pushed along its course. Notice the large white ledge of limestone in the foreground. Its overlying sediments have been washed away. These are Permian age rocks(over 250 million years old).

What you see here is a series of hills covered with grassy vegetation. The hills are primarily made of sand. The grasses help to keep these dune-like piles of sand from being blown away. One thing we have lots of,  in the high plains of Texas, is wind.

My part of Texas is beautiful, ancient, and modern. You can see over 250 million years of time written in the rocks of this country. We are also the location of one of the largest concentrations of wind generators in the world. The rugged beauty of this part of Texas makes my job easy as a photographer because I can always find something interesting to share with you.

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Last night and this morning we had a 3-4 inch snowfall. Snow in my part of Texas is a hit or miss kind of thing. When it happens, I like to photograph interesting subjects coated with snow. Here you can see the Sycamore tree at the end of the driveway accented with snow.

Here is the previous Sycamore’s partner who lives across the driveway. Notice that this one has shed its leaves. (premature baldness??) Sycamores shed their rough outer bark and have green inner bark that is capable of photosynthesis. This property, plus snow, makes for an interesting view of a tree we pass by everyday without much notice. This one is dressed up in its winter finery.

Here are snow covered yucca, lantana, and tree cholla in the front yard. They show how each of these plants collect snow. This snow was the powdery kind, like fine white dust. We were expecting an ice storm to come with this storm but it got cold enough to snow and make everything pretty!

Here in the foreground are Shepherd’s Purse wildflowers that have been growing since mid-September. These plants flower and produce seeds twice per year. We get a crop in the spring and the fall-early winter. Since these little mustard family members are annuals, what flowers and sets seed late in the year are likely sprouts from the spring crop of seeds. Tough, cold adapted little fellas you can eat. Wash them well though, we have neighborhood dogs and cats visiting regularly.

This last one is a closeup of some Shepherd’s Purse coated in snow. It is today’s homage to art in nature. Beauty comes in all shapes and sizes. We live in a universe-sized piece of performance art. We impoverish ourselves by neglecting to notice. Enjoy the wonder, it is one of our saving graces.

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While in Fort Collins, Colorado, you should plan time to walk through the beautiful Trial Gardens on the campus of the University of Colorado.

It is well worth the trip if you like flowers because they have plenty of beautiful flowers for you to experience.

Here you see a red or ruby Begonia flower. These are all pretty standard house or garden plants available in the U. S.

Here is an example of a Pink variety of Begonia. One of the cool things about a Trial Garden is you get to see new varieties that have been produced by plant breeders to bring new shapes and colors.

This is a new variety of Begonia called Fragrant Falls Peach. Notice how different the flower is from standard Begonias.

In this image you can see two varieties of Coleus. This plant is prized for its colorful leaves. On the left of the image you can see a Coleus variety that is like the ancestral plant, all green on its leaves. Next to it is a variety called Flamethrower Serrano. It has mostly red leaves with thin green margins.

In this image you can see a Coleus variety called Flamethrower Salsa Roja which has all red leaves.

Here we have another type of Coleus called Flamethrower Chipotle where the red in the center of the leaves is reduced and is replaced by a thicker green zone at the leaf margin.

By controlling which plants are pollinated by which plants, breeders can encourage the production of Coleus offspring with the traits they desire. As a result, we get new beautiful new versions of plants for decorating our homes and gardens.

The Trial Gardens at the University of Colorado are a worthwhile experience for anyone traveling through the area during the summer. They have everything from Begonias to Zinnias. Plus, this remarkable collection can be seen for the price of a walk through their beautiful gardens!

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On a recent visit to Rocky Mountain National Park, I was able to photograph some of the plant and animal life that live in the alpine tundra ecosystem at the Forest Canyon Overlook, elevation: 11,716 feet. This is a little less than 2 and a quarter miles above sea level. How’s that for really, really high?

In this first image you see the glacial moraine that forms the wall of the Forest Canyon, a valley shaped by ancient glaciers. The rocks visible here were dropped by the glacier and were the pieces it used to abrade the walls and floor of the valley to produce what you see today.

This image shows the alpine tundra that exists above the treeline, in fact, tundra means land without trees. The wind and weather here is too extreme for tree growth and the grasses and other plants which live here are able to withstand the wind, cold and short growing season.

Here is a Dandelion, Taraxacum officinale. It is hugging the ground and is somewhat protected by the surrounding stones. I suspect the stones help shield it from the windy conditions and they absorb sunlight which may help warm the dandelion’s space.

Here is a Halictid bee on another dandelion. I was a little more than surprised to see insects and flowers at this altitude because grasses don’t need pollinators. My respect for the toughness of this kind of bee and for the dandelion has increased.

This image shows a Common Yarrow (Achillea millefolium). This is a new species for me. I love going places and discovering things I have never seen. It is one of the benefits of travel to exotic places and a blessing of the national park system. The leaves on this plant are very feathery, fern-like. Took me a good while to identify this plant and you can read more about these rascals here, here and here.
You would never guess this plant is kin to a sunflower but they both belong to the Daisy family: Asteraceae.

In this image, you can see my foot. This is generally a no-no for photographers, but I included it to give you some idea of the size of the Red Turnip Beetle (Entomoscelis americana, family:Chrysomelidae) that I spotted while tromping along the trail at the Forest Canyon Overlook. Most folks were zipping along the trail to see the canyon and to soak up the scenic mountains, as for me, I tend to keep my eyes peeled for interesting things to photograph.

In this last image, you can see a somewhat blurry image of this tiny little fellow. His coloration is remarkable and is why he caught my eye in the first place. This is another creature I have encountered for the first time in these high mountains far from any turnips. Stuff like this delights me with the questions it raises about where this beetle fits into an ecosystem in a difficult place to live. It is nice, at my age, to enjoy the feelings of wonder engendered by these encounters. You can visit here and here to learn more about this little fellow.

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My wife and I went to Rocky Mountain National Park in August 2018 to take pictures of this rugged, beautiful portion of the Rocky Mountains. In the image above, you see the length of the glacial valley known as Horseshoe Park. You reach this viewpoint on US 34 out of Estes Park, Colorado. The line of sight pictured here is to the southeast. I have labeled some of the local mountains to help orient the viewer.

In the second image, I have enlarged the far end of Horseshoe Park to show the curved walls of the valley between Dark Mountain and Lumpy Ridge. These shapes show the power of glaciers to cut these granite mountains to produce the terrain you see today.

In the third image, the alluvial fan produced by the Roaring River is visible. This fan is located at the juncture of the Roaring River and the Fall River. The Fall river flows through Horseshoe Park and on into Estes Park. Fast moving water descending steep inclines can move large rocks and boulders as well as finer sediment. The alluvial fan was created in 1982 by a catastrophic flood caused by the collapse of an old earthen dam at the mouth of Lawn Lake roughly 4.5 miles upstream and 2500 feet higher in elevation. The dam wasn’t properly maintained by its owners and its failure cost 3 lives and 31 million dollars in damage to Estes Park. Read more about that here, and here.

Erosion by water continues the work started by the glaciers to shape these mountains and valleys. Melting snow, high in the mountains, can produce periodic floods in the tributary rivers that feed the Thompson River draining this part of the Rocky Mountain National Park. Mother Nature takes no vacations from her work and sometimes what she produces is spectacular.

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Red Rock Canyon State Park is just off Interstate Highway 40, about 5 miles south of Hinton Oklahoma. My wife and I visited there on our way back from Oklahoma City recently. It is an interesting place to visit because of its geology and scenery. There are places for visitors to camp and explore while in the park. The Plains Indians used this canyon as a winter campsite and settlers on the “California Road” would visit for fresh water and a place to camp, too. (Wikipedia)

The canyon that forms the park has been cut by a tributary of Sugar Creek which flows into the Washita River. Red Rock Canyon is formed from the Rush Springs Sandstone which is a formation that is about 300 feet thick. This formation was deposited in the late Permian era about 270-250 million years ago. The sediments were eroded from the Ouachita mountains to the east and the Rockies to the west. 150 feet of this formation is exposed in the park, and the actual floor of the canyon is 20 to 50 feet below the alluvial sediments that visitors see, walk, and drive upon.

The flow of Sugar Creek is provided by local runoff from the surrounding land and by natural springs and seeps from the porous sandstone. The park is occasionally closed when flooding occurs.

The erosional processes that have produced this canyon are believed to have started during the Pleistocene period. Geologists disagree about how long these processes took to form the canyon. Some say it has taken a million years and others think it has only taken 115,000 years.

If you are interested in more detail about the geologic history of the park, you can read a 1996 article by Neil Suneson and Kenneth Johnson that expands upon what I have quoted from them here.

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This view is in July. The water is released from the Blakely Dam and runs down this stretch of the Ouachita river into Lake Hamiltion near Hot Springs, Arkansas. The mist on the water forms because the water is cooler than the surrounding air and helps cool the air above. Additionally, the nights here were cooler than places like Texas during this time. Both conditions produced misty mornings on the river.  Great for photographs like this.

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