Dan's Outside

I go, I see, I do, I walk, I think, I like…

Time for a Photograph

I just noticed that there are no photographs on this home page – that doesn’t happen very often, so here is a recent photograph.


Bird Rock and Winter Surf, Dusk. Point Lobos State Reserve, California. December 30, 2007. © Copyright G Dan Mitchell.

(A reminder: Photographs are posted daily at my photography web site.)

January 27, 2008 Posted by | Commentary, Ocean | Comments Off on Time for a Photograph

Dare We Hope?

Last year’s rainy season in California was a bust. Precipitation was half of normal in many areas of the state and much lower than that in many parts of southern California. Last April I returned from Death Valley and drove home up the east side of the Sierra on Highway 395 – in early April it looked like mid-summer already with almost no snow left. By late summer parts of the southern Sierra were as parched as I’ve ever seen them.

This season started out with some surprise early season rain and snow storms – I saw snow several times during October visits to the eastern Sierra. But then the tap was shut off and it looked like we were heading into a second drought year.

During the past few weeks things have really turned around. First, the early January “storm of the decade” dropped a lot of rain and snow all over California. Since that time the wet weather has continued almost unabated. It has rained much of the past week, it is raining today, and it promises to remain cold and damp for the rest of the week.

Maybe, just maybe we’ll have something like a normal season this year? Spring flowers? Desert flowers in April? Sierra wildflowers throughout July? I’m becoming more optimistic!

January 27, 2008 Posted by | Commentary | 3 Comments

Another End of Term Bush Insult?

Expect to see a string of this stuff during the remaining (mercifully short) year of the environmental disaster known as the Bush administration. A week or so ago it was the opening of sensitive arctic areas to unnecessary oil production, yesterday it was a plan to kill more wolves, and today it was a plan for more corporate welfare for logging firms in Alaska.

About the wolves:

Under pressure from another alpha predator, human hunters (along with state officials eager to keep hunters happy), the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has changed a rule in a way that has wildlife campaigners howling.

The complaints are not about the section allowing someone to kill a wolf attacking, say, a dog or livestock. It’s the part about states and tribal governments having the right to allow greatly expanded killing of wolves in “non-essential” populations where local officials determine that wolf packs are taking too big a share of deer and elk herds also coveted by hunters.

What is a “non-essential” wolf. Anyone?

January 26, 2008 Posted by | Commentary | 4 Comments

Yosemite Valley Railroad – A Piece of History Lives

Almost since I’ve lived in California I remember wondering about the railroad bed that follows the Merced River along the canyon bottom approach to El Portal and Yosemite Valley.

Thanks to Andy Frazer (see here also) I came across the web site describing the restoration of the observation car from the train that travelled between Merced and El Portal (at the Yosemite border) for something like 40 years during the first half of the last century.

January 26, 2008 Posted by | Commentary, History | Comments Off on Yosemite Valley Railroad – A Piece of History Lives

Black Diamond Mines

Tom visited the Black Diamond Mines Regional Preserve this weekend – a place I’ve never hiked and barely heard of. Among other things, his piece includes photographs proving that spring is here – well sort of… the California lowland hills are starting to head toward that impossibly green condition we’ll experience only a few weeks from now.

January 22, 2008 Posted by | Commentary | 1 Comment

Mt. Hamilton Land Protected

According to SFGate, a “ranch the size of San Francisco [is] to be protected from development near Mt. Hamilton.

A huge stretch of land near Mt. Hamilton that is roughly the size of San Francisco has been donated as a conservation easement by the Hewlett and Packard families to protect the property from development, the Nature Conservancy said today.

The protection of the 28,359-acre San Felipe Ranch from development will complete a 70-mile long corridor of protected natural lands that extends from Pacheco Pass to Livermore Valley, according to the Conservancy.

The land, which has oaks, year-round streams, seasonal ponds and wildflower meadows, was volunteered as a conservation easement by the families about 10 years after the Conservancy identified the ranch’s “combination of the large amount of intact flourishing habitat and the location” as one of its top priorities for protection in the Mount Hamilton and Diablo range just outside San Jose, according to a statement by the Conservancy.

Not a lot of information was yet available when the article was released, but this sounds like a great development for everyone who loves the outdoor environment of Central California.

January 20, 2008 Posted by | Commentary, Environment | 1 Comment

A Coe Park Trip Report

Other Tom (Tom Clifton) has posted a nice piece about the beauties of the Central California oak/grassland environment as part of a report (with photos) on his recent and first visit to Henry Coe State Park.

January 20, 2008 Posted by | Commentary | Comments Off on A Coe Park Trip Report

A Hike. Finally

Two weeks ago I was hit by this awful bug/cold/flu that seems to be going around here in the Bay Area. The pattern is that it doesn’t seem that bad at first, but it lasts… and lasts… and lasts. I have students who took three weeks or more to get over it.

Needless to say, it was all I could do to get to work during the past week and a half. (First week of the winter term, so it would be a pretty bad time for me to take a week off!) Finally today I felt enough better to try an actual hike – out on the Skyline To The Sea Trail at Big Basin. I managed to do perhaps 6 or 7 miles – slow, but at least I was out.

January 20, 2008 Posted by | Commentary | Comments Off on A Hike. Finally

A Whale of a Stupid Move

The New York Times Dot Earth blog reports on The White House and the Whales – definitely worth reading. The good news is that we now have less than a year of this embarrassing travesty of an administration left to endure.

January 17, 2008 Posted by | Commentary, Environment | 1 Comment

A Youthful View of Environmental Issues

Cole Camplese points to an interesting example of student work on an environmental theme.

January 17, 2008 Posted by | Commentary, Environment | Comments Off on A Youthful View of Environmental Issues

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