Ashland Daily Photo
Ashland Daily Photo - A picture a day from beautiful Ashland, Southern Oregon USA in the Rogue Valley
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Posts tagged flowers

Wagner Butte Hike (4 of 7)

As a hiker approaches the top of Wagner Butte the scene changes again. Instead of forest, desert, wildflower-covered field, or grassy meadow there are a few rocks to climb (not difficult) to get to the top.

I have never seen a dandelion seed head this big before. I should have put a finger in the photo to give the viewer a point of reference. Usually they are smaller than a golf ball, but this one (and the others in the field on the Wagner Butte trail) was bigger than my fist.

The sign on the top of Wagner Butte has been there for probably a couple decades now. The elements have not been kind, and it is now barely readable.

Wagner Butte (3 of 7)

Looking west (and maybe a bit south) from the western slopes of Wagner Butte yields the above view which is probably Little Applegate in the foreground. I’m not sure what mountain ranges go beyond that.

As I mentioned yesterday, sometimes the landscape can get a bit desert like; however, frequently there are wildflowers right in the middle of these scenes. I wonder how different this view would be in the morning (or a month or two earlier). I took this photo in the late afternoon in early September.

Along the Wagner Butte trail you cross a dozen or so streams. This late in the year they were mostly a trickle of water, but in spring, or while it is raining, I imagine they can be somewhat tricky to cross. This one was probably twenty feet across of mud in early September so crossing over via the log helped to keep shoes from becoming a mess even without a small river coming down the mountainside.

My new 10-24mm lens can do some pretty cool things in the macro photography world, nice bokeh too. I was surprised how close I could get and still focus. The specs said the minimum focus distance was 9.5 inches, but I was less than that far away on this photo (and even closer on some others I’ll show you in the next few days). My other lens really does require a distance between the end of the lens and the focus subject of at least a foot and a half.

This flower probably looked much better a week or two earlier in the year. I’d like to do this hike in, say, July and then again in September of the same year to compare the wildflowers. Do some last all summer long or are there totally different wildflowers blossoming and dying as the summer progresses?

Dusk from Mt. Ashland

mount ashland oregon dusk

Wildflowers and distant mountain ranges from Mt. Ashland

I have posted quite a few photos with Mt. Ashland in the background. Today’s pic is a little different as I took it last night while walking to the top of Mt. Ashland while looking south (into California mostly). The mountainside was covered in wild flowers. I couldn’t see all of the mountain ranges in the distance a few minutes before with the bright, summer sun. But as soon as the sun began to set, everything came into focus. It was that magical 10 minutes of the day that happens only at dawn or dusk.

Sunflowers and other wildflowers

wildflowers meadow sunflowers

My timing was off to make this photo really work. I took it before 8 a.m. in the morning, but I think it would have come out much better before 7 a.m. or at dusk. Stumbling across a field of sunflowers and other wildflowers is always fun though, no matter the time of day. These sunflowers were actually huge. I was at quite a distance and couldn’t get closer due to a fence.

View from the slopes of Grizzly Peak

mount ashland and city of ashland oregon

This much snow left on Mt. Ashland in mid-June is possibly a first. The field at my feet when I took this photo was loaded with wildflowers. I wish I had gotten there about an hour earlier, though, as the sun was too bright (even though it was before 8 a.m.). I’ll have to try photographing from this location again at dusk.

You can see my location in this photo. I was, what appears to be, halfway up Grizzly Peak in that picture. In reality, I was no where near halfway up the mountain.

Rhododendrons

rodies blossoming rhododendron

We’ve been watching the rhodies bloom in our yard this past week. These are just outside my front door. I took this photo with my Nikon D7000 and new lens. I took a half dozen photos with a flash as there was no longer much sun, it being late in the day. However, this photo, without flash, was my favorite.

Iris flower

iris flower

The irises are currently at their peak in town. I took this photo outside my office on campus this past week.

Pear Capital of the World?

There is a bit of controversy over where exactly the “Pear Capital of the World” is. Kelseyville, California call themselves the Pear Capital of the World, but they don’t grow nearly as many pears as the Rogue Valley in Southern Oregon. Plus, Harry & David (famous for pears) is located in Medford, not Kelseyville.

I took today’s photo on the last day of April, when the pear blossoms were at their peak, in a field with thousands of pear trees located in Talent or Phoenix (or somewhere in between the two). For some, unknown reason the annual Pear Blossom Parade and Run takes place in early April, before the pear blossoms and usually before decent weather.

There aren’t many pear orchards right in Ashland, but we have a pear tree in our backyard that just finished blossoming. We are now past the cherry blossoms, pear blossoms, and daffodils. Now, in mid-May, we are getting the dogwood blossoms.

SOU campus in May

churchill hall ashland oregon cherry blossoms

Churchill Hall on the Southern Oregon University campus looks best in early May I think. These ornamental cherry blossoms (I think?) literally weigh these trees down.

Behind Carpenter Hall

Magnolia × soulangeana

This was the scene behind Carpenter Hall (home of the OSF Box Office) last week.

Anyone know the name of this tree with the gigantic purple and white flowers that blooms this time of year?