Archive for May, 2007
One of the challenges of any kind of outdoor photography is dealing with the weather. I’m in the midst of a week-long photography session in the Spokane, Washington area at the moment and nearly froze my fingers off this morning while working in a garden under seriously overcast skies.
This week’s overcast is in strong contrast to the weather I had earlier in May while photographing gardens in the Canadian Okanagan. That week I had one day of partly-cloudy skies (meaning the clouds skittered by, giving alternately sunny and bright overcast conditions) and three days of pure blue sky and bright sunshine.
Ideal weather for garden photography is a bright, high overcast, with enough sun coming through the clouds for soft shadows, but not so much that the contrast between lit and shaded areas is extreme. Unfortunately, it’s not often that I’m blessed with these ideal conditions. I tend to work early in the morning and late in the afternoon for garden landscapes. Mid-day is a good time to take a break and refresh — unless it’s a cloudy day which often means starting later and working during what should be high noon if the sun were out. It’s difficult to predict, and I’ve learned not to completely believe the weatherman.
Sometimes I just have to make do with what I find. Today, that meant waiting around in the morning for the sky to brighten up enough to be worth going out. I had time to read both the Sunday and Monday newspapers while waiting. Then I took an early lunch break when it started raining on me. The light was definitely soft, but with the combinations of plants in the gardens where I was working I was able to make some nice images. It wasn’t quite the light I would have ordered, but it worked.
Late this afternoon I started shooting in a park-like private garden with an incredible collection of Hostas and some nice small conifers. The sun broke through the clouds briefly and I thought I was going to have about three hours of nice light. However, the storm clouds soon rolled back in, the sky darkened, and rain threatened. I packed up and returned to my lodging to wait for another day. Soon after I left the sky opened and a thunderstorm dropped hail, winds picked up to 30 mph, and the temperature plummeted 10 degrees in 30 minutes at the public radio station I was listening to while driving across town.
May 21 2007 | Gardens and Photography | No Comments »
The new Inland Northwest Gardening website now has photo galleries for six gardens in south-central Washington I visited and photographed the last week of April.
One of the more interesting gardens showcases cold-hardy cacti. Ron McKitrick, who gardens on the outskirts of Yakima, has been collecting and growing cacti for nearly 30 years. He’s traveled throughout the Americas to see these interesting plants in the wild and is now growing and propagating a large number of species. I learned during my visit that cacti are native only to the New World. They’re found as far north as the plains of Montana and as far south as Patagonia.
The first cacti to bloom for Ron are the Echinocereus, Escobaria, Mammilaria, Pediocactus, Sclerocactus, and Thelocactus. Opuntia, Cholla, and other species will be along later.
See this unique garden on the Inland Northwest Gardening website under Yakima. Ron’s website is Hillside Desert Botanical Gardens.
May 06 2007 | Gardens | No Comments »
Late April and early May are prime time to view Camas (Cammasia quamash) prairies in western Washington. I visited two of them last week. These prairies were a lush contrast to the open sagebrush-studded area where I’d photographed just a few days earlier in central Washington. Follow the links to see galleries of images from all three places.
Lacamas Lake Park in Clark County was a new area to me, with several modest size Camas prairies, most ringed by Garry Oaks (Quercus garryana). I also came across a plant combination I’d never seen before — Oregon Fawn Lilies growing with Camas.
Mima Mounds Natural Area Preserve, in Thurston County just south of Olympia, is one of the few remaining remnants of mounded prairie in the South Puget Sound area. There’s a paved interpretive trail, as well as two longer loops among the mounds. In addition to Camas, I saw Western Buttercups, Spring Gold, Serviceberry, Kinnickinick, and Early Blue Violets among the grasses. It was a dark and windy afternoon, with rain threatening so I didn’t spend as much time as I might have under more pleasurable weather conditions. continue reading »
May 05 2007 | Native Plants and Photography | No Comments »
I’ve just finished a whirlwind speaking tour, with presentations in Beaverton, Oregon and Richland, Bellevue, and Vancouver, Washington. In between, I photographed in a large handful of central Washington gardens.
Phyllis came up from Central Point to join me at the Cedar Hills Crossing Powell’s Bookstore on April 24 to talk about places to go and flowers to see within a day’s drive of Portland. We usually present individually, but with no rehearsal we kept our audience thoroughly entertained and informed, easily playing off each other to the crowd.
I took off the next morning for Walla Walla, where I was given the grand tour of gardens. I photographed in one impeccibly maintained garden and will get photos online soon. Then it was on to Richland and Kennewick where I visited and photographed more gardens on Thursday and Friday. continue reading »
May 04 2007 | Photography | No Comments »
