Sunday, April 30, 2017

Wildflower Walk at Calico Basin Field Trip April 26, 2017


Eight wildflower enthusiasts met for a morning wildflower walk at the Calico Basin portion of Red Rock National Conservation Area.  The weather was beautiful, sunny, mid-70s and most importantly when you are trying to photograph wildflowers, no wind!

There was a large variety of species that we spotted and photographed (31 species!), with colors including white, yellow, lavender, red, orange, and blue.  A special treat was photographing the rare stream orchids.
  
There are only four species of orchids known to occur naturally in Nevada near streams and seeps, and this is the only one found in Southern Nevada. Several species proved challenging, and fun, to photograph, including these stream orchids, the desert trumpet, and some “belly flowers” that grow no taller than one inch from the ground.  Cacti found in bloom on this trek included the strawberry hedgehog cactus (in abundance), beaver-tail cactus, and a cholla (one plant with one bloom).  We had an unexpected and interesting bonus activity on this walk that didn’t involve wildflowers.  A large group of drone enthusiasts who were in town for a conference had scheduled an outing to Red Rock that day to fly their machines.  Their activity provided us with opportunities to capture images of these amazing drones going through their acrobatics against the backdrop of the beautiful red sandstone.  If you like to photograph beautiful desert wildflowers, we’ll be scheduling a trip to Red Rock Canyon next spring, hoping to experience a nice display like we had this spring.
 

We hope you’ll be able to join us on our next field trip – Thursday, May 25, 2017 (meeting at Desert Vista parking lot, 8am to carpool).  We’ll be headed to downtown Las Vegas for some street photography – this area has beautiful murals painted on several buildings that are fun to photograph, as well as interesting people/scenes.  Optionally, for those interested, we’ll finish with breakfast at the Eat Restaurant which serves breakfast/lunch only…great food!  Hope to see you there!

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