'Shroom-Sicle

Day 122: Had it not been for a little ray of sunshine, I might have missed this. In fact, I did miss it on the first pass, although the fact that I chose to walk around the right side of the tree instead of the left when the trail gave me both options might have been responsible for the oversight. On my way back from Big Bridge, a fine needle of sunlight angled through the quilted overstory of hemlock and Douglas-fir to center like a searchlight's beam directly on this ice-encrusted specimen of Pseudohydnum gelatinosum (commonly known as Cat's-tongue). My camera battery was almost dead and I knew I had less than a minute to capture its frosty beauty before the fragment of sunlight disappeared, so I dropped to my knees in the mud even as I was changing settings. How I had managed to be in the forest with both camera batteries in terminal condition is another matter: a banana peel on the path of my attention to small details like recharging, and the unavoidability of Murphy's Law. In any event, I got half a dozen snaps before losing the light, and figured wet, dirty pantlegs were worth the sacrifice if even one of the shots turned out. As I stepped around the tree in the middle of the trail, I found another older, browner specimen also encased in ice, and a question rose in the back of my mind when I noticed that the shelf fungus adjacent to it was not icy, nor was the moss or any of the other vegetation in the area. What conditions prevailed that only Pseudohydnum gelatinosum turned into a popsicle? Why?

Frozen Fungus-Pops

Day 121: It was a cold and frosty morning when I hiked out to Big Bridge, and I was not expecting to find fungi in the heart of winter, but within a few yards of the trailhead, I noticed a grouping of small greyish-brown 'shrooms with white dots on their caps. I may not be an expert mycologist, but their size and shape immediately ruled out the possibility that they were Amanitas (the genus known for its white-spotted caps), so I bent over to take a closer look. The spots were ice: fine, hair-like tendrils of ice, sometimes clustered together, sometimes fanning apart so that individual threads could be seen (note the grouping on the left shoulder of the mushroom on the right). There is a phenomenon known as "hair-ice" which is caused by a fungus, but it occurs on wood, not on mushrooms. I was puzzled by the ice on these 'shrooms and spent much of my hike wondering why it had taken this form. I came up with a theory: that it occurred when guttation droplets froze. Some researchers believe that guttation occurs in fungi as a means to rid themselves of excess moisure. It was a stretch, but perhaps it is possible that a drop in temperature coincided with a guttation event. Unfortunately, I have no way to prove or disprove the hypothesis. I guess I'll just have to enjoy them for what they are: frozen fungus-pops (consumption not advised).

Fractal Fantasy

Day 48: Yeah, I know...it's the time of the year when everybody posts pictures of ice, but ol' Jack did such a lovely job of decorating my bin last night that I can't resist. You could get lost exploring the fractal coastline described by his crystalline map of fjords, inlets and bays, but only for a few minutes until you became aware that his nippers were getting dangerously close to portions of your anatomy you'd prefer to keep intact. Western Washington is experiencing a cold snap of unusual depth for late November. Here, the last several nights have held just barely above 20 F., and the afternoons haven't crept above 40. Twenty years ago, I'd have thought nothing of going for a snowshoe/hike or casting a line to the prospect of a dinner of fresh salmon, but these days, those temperatures even curtail my appreciation of frosty art.

C For Ceiling

Day 158: "C for ceiling, G for ground." That's the mnemonic my mother taught me to help me remember where the base of a stala-C-tite or a stala-G-mite was rooted. There are variations to this simple memory aid, but it's surprising the number of people who refer to either formation as a "stalactite" regardless of its roots.

The Longmire ice stalactites have fallen thick and fast under this recent spell of summery weather. The roof "glacier" has retreated into non-existence from the Administration Building porch and the deadly sharp icicles have dropped from the eaves to collect in piles of brittle jackstraws at the foundation. I haven't heard any reports of visitors being impaled, but the obliviously curious may just have been the lucky sort.

It's a little weird here at home, stepping out the back door into 70 degrees to find snow still lingering in the shady spots of the yard. Up against the woods, it's still several inches deep, confusing the current invasion by Robins who expected to find bugs in the freshly turned soil of spring molehills. That said, it won't last long. Next up is a round of rain, something we hope is confined to the lowlands lest it inspires a flood of melt from the masses of snow in the high country.

Leaf Litter, A Monochrome Study

Day 56: One definition of "hoarfrost" is "a crystalline deposit of frozen water vapor formed on vegetation and other objects at temperatures below the freezing point." It has been particularly lush during our recent cold snap here in the damp Pacific Northwest. It can take a number of different forms from fine needles to crystals resembling those of sugar "rock candy." It differs from "frost" only semantically; the term "hoar-" is appended when the crystals become more distinct than a thin film of ice. On the other hand, "depth hoar" occurs at the base of snowpack, building on existing snow crystals and frequently attaining much larger dimensions than "surface hoar." The word "hoar" derives from an Old English term meaning gray or old.

Water Wonders

Day 84: In her description of hoar frost in the 1914 edition of "Water Wonders Every Child Should Know," Jean M. Thompson says of a very similar image, "The butterflies have settled to rest." Mrs. Thompson couldn't have known that her book would be one of my life-long treasures, or that it would inspire my future photography. William Bentley's exquisite microphotography was well ahead of its time, and Mrs. Thompson's delicious explanations of the various phenomena fascinated me as a small child. I spent many a winter day capturing snowflakes on a glass microscope slide following her instructions rather too casually, only to have them melt before I could view them through the eyepiece. Oh, how I longed to see water in its myriad crystalline forms!

As a mountaineer, I witnessed ice in many bizarre forms and shapes; whittled by wind, brittle in decay, sharply angular deep in the protection of crevasses. I always thought of "Water Wonders" when I stumbled across some new geometry, but in pursuit of a summit conquest, I acknowledged its beauty only with a nod as I hurried through its dangers. Lingering was not an option, nor was carrying the additional weight of close-up lenses and gear.

A year or so ago, I invested in a set of macro filters (not lenses!) for my bridge camera. I had difficulty with them at first, not realizing that I could zoom in closer if I stepped farther back from my subject. Once I made that conceptual breakthrough, I seldom went out without at least the 4x magnification in my kit. Now that winter is upon us (with a vengeance, if I may say so...9° last night!), I am able to create water-wonder photos which I hope would make Mrs. Thompson proud.

Hoar

Day 48: It's hard to unlearn something when that "knowledge" is deeply ingrained. What I have always referred to as "rime" has been hoarfrost in 95% of all cases, the exception being some of the formations I've seen on wintry alpine mountaintops. What's the difference? Well, here's your chance to join me in practicing my motto: learn something new every day.

True rime is the product of a freezing fog. Hoarfrost is the deposition of ice crystals formed from moisture in the air and occurs in the absence of fog. Rime accumulates when water droplets come into contact with a cold surface. It generally grows toward the prevailing wind. Hoarfrost forms when there is no wind. That said, the literary convention of using "rime" to represent any form of frost is acceptable, but one source says that "compared to rime, hoarfrost forms larger, more delicate crystals, but it is often difficult to tell the two apart; when in doubt 'rime' is never entirely wrong." Still, I'm going to make a point to use the more scientifically accurate semantics from here on out.

Beaver Pond

Day 87: I took an extended lunch in order to walk beyond the Park's back gate and out to Skate Creek Road today, slipping and sliding on ice in some places and slogging in mud in others, glad of an occasion when I could visit the Beaver Pond in wintry conditions. I've spent many a happy summer hour here, tormenting a modest population of native cutthroat trout in between untangling my backcast from the branches of the alders, but never before when snow blanketed its setting. I knew it had to be beautiful; it is a gem in June, its colors changing like a tanzanite, reflecting the greens of grass and tree at one angle and an azure sky from another. In the hues of winter's palette, it could be no less, but winter posed a problem for access. Skate Creek Road, which goes only from Ashford to Packwood, cannot justify a budget for plowing (or, for that matter, general maintenance), and is closed when the snow flies. The Park road is a spur angling off it, and on the wrong side of a locked gate. Access, therefore, is by foot, and from the Administration Building at Longmire, it is a little over two and a half miles to the pond. In deeper snow, that distance would be too much to tackle on a lunch break. Today, however, was slow. I finished my assignments early and was granted leave to be away from my desk longer than usual. Thus I wound up here, sharing a new season with an old friend. Just a wink of blue sky appears as a reflection of past summers, an acknowledgement of our history together.

Ice, Stone And Flow

Day 51: In my hand is a dog-chewed, yellowed, taped, and altogether cherished book entitled "Water Wonders Every Child Should Know," by Jean M. Thompson, published in 1914. It was my mother's when she was a child, and I came to love it long before I understood the science. In fact, it was my introduction to the fantastical frozen world I later sought out as a mountaineer, that realm where ice takes form as complex crystalline structures with a beauty found otherwise only in the arctic lands. In my climbing years, I saw ice-coated rocks, each face bearing an entirely different series of shapes: curls, coils, bubbles, prisms, columns and the like, and whole mountaintops blanketed in long feathers of wind-etched rime. I first met snow-rollers in those pages, and only later discovered them on the high slopes of Mount Rainier and other northwestern peaks, and in some alpine meadows as well, where conditions favoured their formation. In the depths of crevasses, I found perfect hexagonal plates, seemingly pierced through their centers, arranged on a central spindle of ice like tomatoes on a shish-kebab skewer. I will not say that I have seen all the wonders described in Ms. Thompson's book, but I have had a fair sampling.

Even though my tolerance for cold is growing less as I age, the magical kingdom of frost and snow still fascinates me. Stiff in layers of wool and fleece, I may still be found on my hands and knees at the base of some small fall of water, admiring Nature's most impermanent art.

Haven In The Hawthorn

Day 94: You'd think Robin Red-Breast would freeze his little gizzard gulping down icy hawthorn berries, but as I watched, this bird swallowed at least half a dozen, rolling them around in his beak to knock off the larger bits of ice. It was party time in the hawthorn, Robins competing with Steller's Jays for their breakfast fruit. Oddly, the birds leave the tree alone until the temperatures plummet. Perhaps these berries are the avian slant on frozen dessert.