Journeys›Photograph

Snowmelt and Sagebrush East of Truckee

·Truckee, California·#tahoe#snow#spring#sierra nevada#landscape-photography
Snowy mountains rise behind a forest of pine trees and foreground shrubs under a clear blue sky.

Took the roads east of town today, through the wildlife area that follows the river a few miles below Truckee. The crest is still carrying real snow — the ski runs across the valley stood out white against the timber — but down in the sagebrush it's bare ground, with the first green just starting along the drainages.

The reservoir surprised me: a wide band of sand between the trees and the waterline, lower than I'd expect for the end of April with that much snow left up high. The river itself was moving, though, snowmelt pushing through the meadow and braiding around the willows under the power lines. All of it headed northeast eventually, out of the Sierra and into Nevada, where the same water that holds the trout here keeps the irrigation district running out in the desert.

Last stop was a pond tucked into a sagebrush draw, two mallards working across the middle of it. Couldn't tell whether it holds water through the summer or only now, while the hills are still draining.

Dense dry brush in the foreground, with green pine trees and blue, snow-capped mountains under a clear sky.A wide blue lake in the foreground, a sandy shore, and a dense evergreen forest under a blue sky with scattered clouds.A wide landscape view of a winding river through a valley with pine forests and distant snow-capped mountains.A pond with two ducks surrounded by dry grasses and green shrubs, with hills and trees in the background.

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