I am ever surprised at the harsh environments that life can find a way to survive in. The image above shows some of the stress that these trees are under from wind and snowpack. This is up at over a mile in elevation at Hurricane Ridge in the Olympic National Park. Below is a different part of the Olympic Mountains (outside of the park) … but the group of trees are still up in a subalpine area on Mt Ellinor.
I thought I would share one of the last of the images from our recent hike up the Dosewallips River Trail. The images above was taken with my iPhone 16 Pro Max. Note the lack of a ‘sun burst’ where the sun is peaking around the maple. (for comparison, see previous post https://ajjphotoblog.com/?p=15948)
Below, another view of the Dosewallips River Trail. We both enjoyed hiking this section of the trail where there were lots of dry leaves to kick and crunch. A joy not to have to rake all these! (in the past I spent one day each weekend working on clearing the lawn of leaves this time of year)
Here’s another comparison between a main trail: above see the Dosewallips trail where the forest is reclaiming the old road and below, where a spur trail runs down to a unofficial campsite along the river.
It seems that there are differences in how individual trees in a particular location respond to the advent of fall … leaf coloration and leaf retention. For instance, the image above was taken the same day as the image below … and just a short distance away on the Dosewallips River trail in the Olympic National Forest. I suppose some difference is genetic and some is due to the amount of water each gives in comparison to the other.
More images from the fall colors along the Dosewallips River trail in the Olympic National Forest. The maples here usually are covered in moss. I try to get images where the moss is backlit and causing a green halo around the trunks and limbs. It’s hard to get that to stand out and get the rest of the image properly exposed. Post-production in LIghtroom helps, but it still isn’t perfect, in my opinion. The image below I’m happier with.
