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LATEST ARTICLES ( 441 )

• On the Road: Final Geo-challenge

  

  Where am I? what's all that weird orange rock?! maybe I was out too long.Plants and Rocks is back from vacation, with one more geo-challenge to share. But I... Read more

  Posted on 31 October 2014 OUTDOORS

• On the Road: Geo-challenge 2

  

  Where are we now? View is from behind, as the sun sets.Plants Rocks is still on on the road and finding it hard to blog, so here’s another quick geo-challenge. Read more

  Posted on 27 October 2014 OUTDOORS

• On the Road: Geo-challenge 1

  

  Where are we? Plants Rocks is on vacation. First destination was an east-west mountain range often described as an anomaly because contemporaneous ranges... Read more

  Posted on 22 October 2014 OUTDOORS

• Walking the Devil’s Backbone

  

  Driving home from Rocky Mountain National Park we stopped just a few miles west of Loveland, Colorado, to examine the Devil’s Backbone. How could we not?! Read more

  Posted on 12 October 2014 OUTDOORS

• Tree-following: That First Question

  

  Do you remember that first question ... back in February when the cottonwoods were leafless, the ground in snow, and the river under ice? “Is this a single... Read more

  Posted on 07 October 2014 OUTDOORS

• Urban Tumbleweeds -- Free & Hardly Lonely

  

  Tumbleweeds are integral to our beloved American West -- a land of wide open spaces where tumbleweeds, cowboys and other free spirits can go wherever the wind... Read more

  Posted on 30 September 2014 OUTDOORS

• Shear Beauty Along the Highway

  

  Crenulated beds (chevron folds) with alpine phlox.Wyoming Highway 130 crosses the Medicine Bow Mountains west of Laramie. Immediately beyond the turnoff to... Read more

  Posted on 27 September 2014 OUTDOORS

• Fall Flower Selfies

  

  Sunflower selfie (Helianthus annuus).“Selfie” was the Oxford Dictionaries Word of the Year in 2013: selfie noun, informal (also selfy; plural selfies): a... Read more

  Posted on 22 September 2014 OUTDOORS

• Ypsilon Mountain, Handiwork of a Master Sculptor

  

  Ypsilon Mountain above blue hat, part of the Mummy Range in northern Colorado.Abbott and Cook say “Ice is Earth’s master sculptor, and in Colorado, Rocky... Read more

  Posted on 14 September 2014 OUTDOORS

• Tree-following: Pilgrims from the East

  

  Being a dedicated Tree-follower, each month I report on my tree, a lance-leaf cottonwood along the Laramie River in southeast Wyoming, USA. Read more

  Posted on 07 September 2014 OUTDOORS

• Gray Day in Yellowstone

  

  Yellowstone National Park -- land of wonders both natural and unnatural.No matter how carefully one plans a vacation, sometimes things just don’t work out. Read more

  Posted on 31 August 2014 OUTDOORS

• Sweetwater River at the Devil’s Gate

  

  Devil's Gate in 2014.In the mid-1800s, hundreds of thousands of gold-seekers, pioneers, pilgrims and other dreamers took the Oregon Trail west. Read more

  Posted on 27 August 2014 OUTDOORS

• The Most Mysterious Mountains in Wyoming

  

  This is the final post in a series about a recent trip through the “Heartland of Laramide Tectonics” in south central Wyoming. By definition, this a folded land. Read more

  Posted on 17 August 2014 OUTDOORS

• Colorado Butterfly Plant and the US Air Force

  

  Last week’s plant quiz featured the Colorado butterfly plant, growing in Wyoming.Every summer for 28 years, field botanists have walked through riparian... Read more

  Posted on 11 August 2014 OUTDOORS

• Tree-following: Mid-summer Miscellany

  

  Let me (re)introduce you to my tree -- a lanceleaf cottonwood, Populus x acuminata.If this is your first encounter with tree-following, first let me explain. Read more

  Posted on 09 August 2014 OUTDOORS

• Hunting Pterosaurs by the Sundance Sea

  

  This post is part of a series about my recent tour of the Heartland of Laramide Tectonics in south central Wyoming. I spent a good amount of time among rocks... Read more

  Posted on 06 August 2014 OUTDOORS

• Mystery Plant + Three Clues

  

  Clue #1, the site:Clue #2, habitat:Mystery plants in foreground, coyote willows behind.The Mystery Plant:Several mystery plants; note red stems.Buds, flowers an... Read more

  Posted on 02 August 2014 OUTDOORS

• Redbeds

  

  glow in the evening sun at Alcova Reservoir.Geologists are of two minds about Wyoming redbeds. Many consider them “perhaps the most striking sedimentary strata... Read more

  Posted on 31 July 2014 OUTDOORS

• Urban Botany, Urban Art and the Instagram Effect

  

  There’s a scrappy little Virginia creeper growing from the crevice below the right rear heel of the giant prairie dog (click on image to view). Read more

  Posted on 27 July 2014 OUTDOORS

• The Great Unconformity is Greater Here.

  

  The juniper-covered hillside above doesn’t look terribly spectacular, but don't be fooled! A really long and puzzling story is told by these rocks -- the ones... Read more

  Posted on 24 July 2014 OUTDOORS