Sunday, June 14, 2009

Poppies and lupins and a bridge?

This is a photo I took of California poppies down in the Sacramento Valley.
And lupins from the same area.Here are some poppies just struggling to survive in a rocky river floodplain up in the Sierra Nevada mountains. Ditto for the lupins. You sometimes find poppies that are lighter or darker than the typical California poppy. I was trying to take a picture of the bee, but she kept moving.This rocky river floodplain is not natural at all. It is 30 or 40 or more feet higher than it should have been because the bottom of the canyon was filled in back in the late 1800s due to hydraulic mining during the California gold rush. I talked more about that in this post. This gravel layer makes a very unstable substrate on which to try and build a bridge. The gravel is slowly being washed out from under this tree. Note the rocks embedded in the roots.

4 comments:

Lesley said...

I lovvvve poppy season. They grow a lot here around Valencia. So beautiful.

The picture of the rock and the roots all intermingled is amazing!

Nice California tag. HEH. ("Hi Mr. Farty!")

Kia said...

Way cool! You don't see those in IN. The flowers, I mean. We have erosion, too.

Lesley said...

The poppies are pretty and whatnot, but I'm over here lookin' for PICTURES OF CLIO, LITTLE MISSY!

Laurie said...

Ok, ok, ok! Soon! I've started writing it, and still have to download the pictures off my camera...