Frost on the window, ice on the creek...

December 10, 2024

Winter morning on the marsh, Turnbull National Wildlife Refuge

A curfew for photons, a phase dance for moisture

Perhaps you don’t have to grow up in the tropics to fully appreciate the nerve-smacking arrival of a northern winter. But I think it may help—the non-negotiable transformation under foot and in plain sight. With its preoccupation to deliver summer to Brazil and Australia, the low winter punches out around 4 p.m.. Here—in the northern Rockies and its skirts of high plains—the nights get longer, as the low winter sun barely rises above the tops of the pines. Besides scarves and gortex, there is also the consolation of wonder—the transformations of water and water vapor; the astonishing artwork of ice and the uncanny resolve of creatures that don’t bother to migrate.

Hoarfrost on redtwig, Spokane River

Male Hooded Merganser, Latah Creek

Young mule deer buck in the frosty pines

Frozen waterfall, Mystic Falls in Indian Canyon park

Hoarfrost in the gloaming, Folsom Farm preserve, western Spokane County

High kicking Trumpeter Swan, Turnbull NWR

River otter with ice on his mustache, Latah Creek

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Ice goblins at Deep Creek, near Nine Mile Falls, WA

Young heron on ice at a scabland pond

Thick frost from lifting ice fog west of Malden, WA

Editor’s note: FYI, if you’re inclined to order any of these prints, or others from the Rhubarb Skies photography store, please do so before noon, Wednesday (tomorrow) if you’re X-mas shopping, to ensure timely delivery.—tjc