A journal of the thoughts, pictures, and adventures of photographer and writer Lee H. Rentz. Inspired by nature, with a passion for ideas both visual and literary.
Each winter temporary ice formations form along the orange sandstone cliffs of Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula. Wherever a tiny stream cascades over a cliff, or where water oozes through porous stone, ice forms upon hitting the frigid temperatures of a Lake Superior winter. These formations are reliable enough to have descriptive names given by the ice climbers who return each winter to test their skills on the frozen columns.
I have photographed the formations over several winters, but the winter of 2023 was my favorite because Karen (my wife) and I experimented with backlighting the ice at twilight and at night to give a sense of the color and translucency of the beautiful formations. I find the natural artistry of the ice as stunning as the sandstone formations of the Utah desert, but these are ephemeral and have to recreate themselves each winter. What an experience!
Ice climbing on Curtainsat sunseKaren Rentz at Amphitheater ice formation, with ice daggers overheadAmphitheater ice formationDetails of ice formations in Pictured Rocks National LakeshoreCurtains ice formation lighted by us at nightCurtains ice formation at the end of a winter dayTwo views of naturally sculpted ice behind the CurtainsBehind the Curtains ice formation, lit by the photographer’s lights and by the twilight outsideIce Daggers of the Amphitheater formationCurtains ice formation lighted at nightIce climbing on Curtains; note the ice tools, rope, helmet, and cramponsNorthern White Cedar twigs encased in ice in the Curtains ice formationBehind the Curtains ice formation with blue twilight coloring the translucent iceDetails of Curtains ice formation lighted at night; the round bubble-like shapes are created by water drops melting from the ice column aboveLate afternoon light on the Amphitheater ice formationSculptural details of the Curtains ice formation lighted at nightKaren Rentz at Amphitheater ice formation: the ice columns emerge from seeps in the sandstoneKaren Rentz exploring behind the Curtains ice formationBehind the Curtains ice formation, the translucent ice is reminiscent of a bridal veilFront view of Amphitheater ice formation named for the shape of the alcove in the cliffsDetails of Curtains ice formation; note how the ice takes different shapesDetails of Curtains ice formation lighted at nightAmphitheater ice formation used by ice climbers in Pictured Rocks National LakeshoreIcicle details of the Curtains ice formationDagger icicle details of the Amphitheater ice formation
Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore is located along Lake Superior in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula. Its namesake cliffs are miles long and make for great adventures all year, whether kayaking, backpacking, day hiking, snowmobiling, snowshoeing, cross-country skiing, or taking a guided cruise past the cliffs at sunset.
When we go in winter, we wear Kahtoola MICROspikes when navigating sheer ice at the ice formations, and we watched many people trying to stay upright when they walked in regular snow boots. Wear them! We also take snowshoes in case there has been a fresh snowfall and the trails are buried in deep fluff, though the short trails from Sand Point Road are often packed down by climbers. We also take cross-country skis to use on the nearby groomed trails. When venturing out in winter, we always wear insulated boots, and dress in layers of merino wool long underwear, waterproof snow/rain pants, and down, fleece, and a Gore-Tex shell. Mittens are essential, and chemical handwarmers can help when it’s really cold out. Take high energy snacks. To us, navigating winter is far more rewarding than enduring the bugs of early summer in the Upper Peninsula; just be prepared.
Important information about Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore:
Loading freshly cut blocks of ice onto a horse-drawn sleigh at an Amish farm
Today was a gift from the universe.
I had an instinct that today (4 February 2023) could be the day when Amish farmers cut ice from their ponds to fill their icehouses after the cold snap of the last week, a warming weather trend ahead, and tomorrow the sabbath. We drove out into the Amish community this morning, and almost immediately saw a freight wagon loaded with ice. We drove on, and found another farm where wagons were lined up in front of a pond, where men wearing straw hats were cutting ice.
We parked at a respectful distance, watching and discretely photographing for about an hour. Then an Amish man came walking up to where we were parked along the road. He was a young man and kindly asked if we had ever seen Amish ice cutting before. We said “only at a distance,” and he invited us to come down closer to see it. I asked if it was okay if I took pictures, and he said “Yes. Just not too close.”
So we went down near to where ten men and teen boys worked as a team to cut the ice with a gas-powered circular saw and load six sleighs and wagons, each drawn by two draft horses. Assorted young boys all wearing matching dark knit hats and a dog completed the perfect rural scene.
We got to talking with the young man and his little brother, and he invited us to have a meal with them. So we sat down for a noontime dinner with the father, mother, 11 of their 13 children, and a couple of young men from a nearby farm. After a hearty meal, they went back to ice cutting and me to my pictures. Magic happens.
As I said, a gift from the universe to two shy people.
Amish men cutting and moving floating blocks of ice to conveyor liftCutting ice with a large circular saw blade
Notes from our conversations with an Amish family:
Since most English (the word used by the Amish for non-Amish people like us) know little about the Amish, I will tell you about our discussions with this kind and generous family. My wife Karen and I talked to the farmer and his wife, as well as with some of their sons, both before and during the meal, learning a bit about their lives. They have 13 children, of whom 11 still live at home. The other two are the older adult children, both married, with the son living on a small farm in an Amish community in Illinois and the daughter at a farm nearby. The children were spaced quite regularly in age, with the youngest son being two. Of their children, nine were boys and four girls. The eldest daughter still living at home now teaches at an Amish one-room schoolhouse eight miles from their house.
The Amish have not been here for as long as they’ve been in Pennsylvania. My parents moved to the area in 1980, when they built the house that we now own. A couple of years after they moved in, one of their friends said that Amish were starting to buy up the surrounding farms, and that the land was about to blossom with new activity and a flourishing of crops. The farmer in my story moved here when he was a boy, in that first wave of Amish. He said that the price of the land was good. The families here have done well, with what appear to be prosperous and beautiful farms.
Amish men moving floating blocks of ice to conveyor belt liftUsing ice tongs to move blocks onto sleighA full load heading to the icehouse
The family has an extensive summer garden, where last year they planted and harvested over five acres of pumpkins and winter squash. Some of their crops are sold at a local open-air produce auction, which we’ve driven past at times when it wasn’t open. It is like a farmer’s market, open only prescribed days each month. At this time of year firewood and hay are for sale, but in summer and fall there would be a wonderful variety of produce and flowers. I remember last year seeing a horse-drawn farm wagon with clear plastic sheeting forming a greenhouse structure over the wagon. Inside there were colorful hanging baskets of flowers protected from wind by the plastic. I think the flowers were headed to the farm auction. Here is an article about this particular auction facility: Stanwood Produce Auction
The young man who initially invited us down to see the ice cutting is 18 years old, friendly, and personable. He talked about the economics of the farm. They have a sawmill, as many of the local Amish farmers do, where loggers bring loads of softwood logs. The farmer brings the logs one by one into the mill, where they are sawn into 2×4’s and other dimensional lumber that is sold to a pallet maker south of Grand Rapids; that factory is perhaps 80 miles away, so the wood has to be transported by truck to the buyer. I’m sure the sawmill is a major source of income for the family. I mentioned that there has been a great increase in the number of Amish farms in our area with sawmills and wondered about the competition. The father said that so far it wasn’t a problem, that there was enough demand and that some of the sawmills were for softwood and others for hardwood. I think they also have a maple sugaring operation, as do many of the local families.
Loading blocks of ice onto a freight wagon to take down the road to another farmStopping to chat
The farmer would also grow corn and hay for feeding the livestock. In early spring he would use a horse-drawn plow (on local farms we’ve seen up to six draft horses pulling a plow!). Horses would also be used in the harvest of hay, with freight wagons piled incredibly high with freshly dried hay.
The farm has ten cows for milking, which has to be done twice each day. In fact, the purpose of this family’s ice harvesting is to build a store of ice that can be used the rest of the year to keep the milk cold. The milk is sold to nearby people who come by once a week to pick up a gallon as part of a farm share program.
We asked the son if Amish had to get jobs to make ends meet. He said that in the last few years the economics of farming alone don’t work, so it is common to have to get a job outside the community. In the local Amish community, all the farms have a small business of some sort: making rustic furniture, creating poly-wood furniture, repairing clocks, caning chairs, butchering cows, making rugs, selling eggs, making boat covers, and probably a dozen more crafts that bring in money.
The day looked like fun for all involved, especially the young boys looking on
On our visit there were two families working together to cut ice to fill two icehouses. The patriarch of the host farm operated the gasoline-powered circular saw used to cut the ice. This year the ice was only about six inches thick; more commonly it has been eight or up to twelve inches thick, so it would be harder to heft those blocks. The ice cutting machine is homemade, with a long lever used to raise and lower the spinning blade. He cut the pond ice almost all the way through, stopping about 1/2” short of cutting through. Then another man used a long steel pole to break off the blocks. A heavy rope stretched across the pond was used by two workers to move the floating blocks of ice to where the loading conveyor belt was located at one end of the pond. Then the men used pitchforks to prod the blocks onto the conveyer, which is also their hay lifter, powered by a gasoline motor. The Amish use some modern assistance when they deem it appropriate.
The family that owns the ice pond uses horse-drawn sleighs to transport blocks of ice to their icehouse, while young men from the farm down the road used horse-drawn freight wagons. We counted a total of six sleighs and wagons, each pulled by a team of two massive draft horses. They took turns at the conveyor machine that was lifting ice from the pond. Once one vehicle was filled with a layer of ice, the driver would quickly move it away. Another was already lined up to move into position, with the driver sometimes using the team of horses to back up the wagon to the loading chute. Managing horses to back up this way is an incredible skill and they do far better than I do trying to back up a trailer with a car! Most of the sleighs and wagons were drawn by two Belgian horses, the predominant breed in our area, which are usually chestnut-colored with blond manes. A few of the wagons were drawn by black Percheron horses. We were told that the white horse in one team was actually a Percheron, born black and then it had turned pure white.
The massive Belgian horses make great teams for hauling ice and plowing land
One young boy named Neil enjoyed talking to us and telling us about his life on the farm. He asked if we had a farm, and we had to answer no, but that it looked like a lot of fun to live on a farm. He was in the fourth grade at school; I asked him what his favorite subject was and after thinking for a moment, he said “reading.” He said they were reading a book by Laura Ingalls Wilder called “Little House in the Big Woods.” He said that sometimes the teacher reads and that the children also take turns reading. He said that another grade level reads “Farmer Boy,” another Wilder book that I told him I had read as a boy. It has been many years since I read it, but I remembered that I first learned about tapping maple trees from that book. I needed a refresher about the story, so here is what Wikipedia says about Farmer Boy:
“The novel is based on the childhood of Wilder’s husband, Almanzo Wilder, who grew up in the 1860s near the town of Malone, New York. It covers roughly one year of his life, beginning just before his ninth birthday and describes a full year of farming. It describes in detail the endless chores involved in running the Wilder family farm, all without powered vehicles or electricity. Young as he is, Almanzo rises before 5 am every day to milk cows and feed stock. In the growing season, he plants and tends crops; in winter, he hauls logs, helps fill the ice house, trains a team of young oxen, and sometimes — when his father can spare him — goes to school.”
This sounds exactly like the life of young Neil: no wonder he loves the Laura Ingalls Wilder books!
I asked Neil if he milks the ten cows, and he said he was still too little for that, but that he feeds their five calves and many chickens each day. He also collects the eggs daily from two chicken coups. I asked him how many eggs: he was unsure of the numbers, but maybe 30-50 from each coup (he said the total was never 100). He pointed out the pony they had gotten and was very fond of it. We asked if they name their animals and he said “no” and he laughed; that seemed like a strange idea to him. He was really glad that this year ice cutting was on a Saturday when he wouldn’t be at school, so he could watch and be part of it. He recalled when they had a backhoe come in to dig the large bowl-shaped pond for the ice. Later we saw him riding on an ice sleigh, and it looked like it would be a day of heaven for a ten year old! Neil has an infectious smile and enjoyed telling us about his life.
With six sleighs and wagons, there was always a wait to get to the loading areaThis scene could have been from 150 years ago
My dear readers, you must be wondering what it’s like to be inside an Amish house; I know we have been curious for years. We finally got our chance when we were invited in for noon dinner. We drove into their driveway and were shy about knocking on the door, in case the Amish wife hadn’t been told of our arrival. After a moment, she appeared at the door with a small son and I walked up to say hello. She said “Will you be joining us for dinner?” So of course I said “yes.”
We went inside, and she escorted us from the entry room, through the dining room/kitchen, to the living room. The living room had a wood-burning stove and the dining table/kitchen area was warmed by the cook stove. The openings between the rooms were large, giving the feel of one big room and also helping to provide even heat to the first floor. We believe that the large room is also used for community church services, but on some farms they use the barn instead of the house. The Amish don’t have a church to go to; instead, they take turns holding services for the nearby community. Every two weeks the community holds Sunday services; each farm hosts for two Sundays, then they rotate to another farm. This family was going to host church services at their home the next day. We have seen Sundays when a farmyard is filled with buggies, perhaps 20 to 30 at a time. Recently we saw children walking home from church, the girls in their black woolen coats, white aprons, and black bonnets, and the boys dressed formally as well.
The Amish house where we had our noontime dinner is in the distance
There is no electricity in an Amish home, so natural light during the day and oil or gas lamps at night are the sources of illumination. No televisions or computers, of course. And no plush furniture. Around the perimeter of the living room were wooden rocking chairs, which is where Karen and I sat while waiting for the meal. The youngest boys sat lined up on rocking chairs along one wall, reading long hand-written letters. I didn’t ask who the letters were from, but I could imagine that they could be from the family of their brother who had moved to Illinois and other distant relatives. And, unlike most English children today, they had no problem reading the letters written neatly in cursive!
The house was a comfortable temperature. The lady of the house said she is fortunate that her husband has a sawmill, because there is always plenty of wood to keep their home warm. They cooked on a huge old cast iron wood-burning stove, which also helped heat the house.
There were no family portraits or pictures on the walls, since the Amish don’t wish to have recognizable pictures of themselves, instead believing that humility is to be honored, and individuality and pride are harmful to the community. They follow the Biblical commandment “Though shalt not make unto thyself a graven image.” I took pictures after getting permission from one man and nobody seemed to object, but I was careful to photograph the activity and not the individual. No portraits.
After a few minutes, the Amish wife told us it was time for the meal and indicated two places where we could sit. As you might imagine from the size of the family, the long rectangular table was huge; I think there were 13 of us sitting around it, with the father at the head of the table. Three daughters remained in the kitchen and served the food. When everyone was seated, the Amish father bowed his head; everyone took his cue and bowed their heads as well and all thought a silent prayer for about a minute. Following that, bowls of food were passed.
Dinner was hearty; after all, the men working outside had been cutting and hauling ice, hitching and unhitching teams of huge horses, and lifting heavy blocks of ice into and out of wagons. They were hungry! There were two sets of bowls serving each of the foods because the table was so large. The young men took huge helpings of mashed potatoes and gravy. The meat entree was excellent meatballs and sauce (Karen had to poke me for initially trying to take three meatballs when she noticed that everyone else took two!). There was a bowl of mixed vegetables, a smaller bowl of cabbage salad, and a plate of sliced cheese. After everyone had their fill, two desserts were passed: a chocolate pudding pie and an apple dish that might have been apple crisp. The oldest daughter was the baker.
The young Amish men were curious about our Washington license plates, and we told them we live there most of the year. They asked about Washington state and had heard that part of the state got considerable rain. They wondered why rain and not snow, since it was about the same latitude as Michigan and they seemed to understand when we explained how the influence of the warmer ocean moderates the temperature.
The family enjoyed hearing our story from several years ago of driving an icy road and coming upon a wagon loaded with ice blocks off the road in a ditch. I stopped and asked if I could help. The young man asked me how many horse power I had under the hood of my Subaru and we all laughed. They had another team of horses on the way to help.
They wanted to know where we lived locally and what we did during the day, though what we do is less interesting than what they do! We were at a bit of a loss as to what to say we do, as it didn’t seem appropriate to tell them how much time we spend with our computers or watching television. We asked a lot of questions about their lives and they were pleased to answer. Nice people. I noticed that the school-age children said virtually nothing during the meal (perhaps something about being seen and not heard!). They also all noisily completely cleaned their plates with the sharp sound of silverware striking china. No food was wasted.
After dinner, all bowed their heads again to thank God for the meal. Then everyone disappeared to complete their ice cutting tasks, with the women and girls staying inside to clean up after the meal. In Amish life the roles of men and women are well defined and traditional.
The men had to gather up the horses, who had also been given a break from the harness to feed on hay in the barn, so they all had to be reattached to their sleighs and wagons. We said our thank-yous and goodbyes, pulled on our boots, and went back to our car. I took a few more pictures–actually, the best of the day–and we took our leave. It was an extraordinary experience for us, and it felt like the family enjoyed talking with us, letting us into each other’s lives for a few hours. I bow my head in grace for the time we spent among the Amish.
A day’s work well done, with all enjoying the experience
This article was completed with the kind help of my wife Karen, who contributed immensely to the memories, writing, and editing. To see many of the photographs I’ve taken over a lifetime, go to leerentz.com
Thousands of years passed, blizzards howled over Iceland’s Katla Volcano in whiteouts that blocked out time and place. Uncountable snowflakes fell, dissolving the landscape. Immense compression squeezed the forming ice, forcing out air bubbles and creating a material of intense clarity and glacial plasticity. Gravity took over as the ice accumulated, and glacial ice flowed like a river that ignored time, down the volcano’s hidden ridges, scraping and sculpting the mountain, which was now hundreds of feet below the gleaming ice cap.
When we arrived at Kötlujökull glacier, a lobe of Mýrdalsjökull Glacier, we saw ice that was thousands upon thousands of years old. It ended abruptly at the glacial terminus, which was a sheer wall of ice over 100 feet high. Our small group entered a cave in the glacier, created by a flowing glacial stream and polished by air currents. These photographs represent the incredible sculpted and colored walls of the inner sanctum of the glacier.
Passage into an ice cave in Mýrdalsjökull Glacier on Katla VolcanoA melted vertical shaft, called a moulin or glacier mill, was the most dramatic feature of our ice cave tourAnother view looking straight up the moulin toward the sky; imagine trying to climb out, even with ice climbing equipment!Bands of scalloped ice in the moulin, with the different colors representing changing conditions when the ice formed and compressedPolished ice surfaces approaching the moulin openingIce fantasy fringed with icicles inside the ice caveWall of melting ice and icicles, reflecting the blue sky outsideThe highlight of our journey was entering a narrow cavern in the ice and following it into the glacier until we were blocked by a wall of ice. Here Karen Rentz is inside an ice cave channel, formed seasonally by running water, her headlamp and mine illuminating the iceThe ice channel curved and twisted through the glacierFanciful textures and patterns of ice, rich with glacial aquamarine coloringIcicles at entrance to the ice cave, with hardly a hint of what awaits withinThe glacial terminus, which we approached and then entered through a small openingKaren Rentz using rope and crampons to ascend to cave entranceAdventurers walking toward an ice cave entrance. If you go to Iceland and wish to explore an ice cave, make sure you spend the extra money and go on a small tour led by a leader driving a SuperJeep (the Icelandic name for any really rugged 4WD vehicle). Some bus tours pack people into a large cave along with hundreds of others, and the experience is that of a herd.Mýrdalssandur outwash plain looking out from the ice cave entrance, Hafursey Mountain. This is where part of Rogue One: A Star Wars Story was filmed.Dramatic entrance to an ice cave in a lobe of Mýrdalsjökull Glacier
We visited Iceland in March of 2018, with the intent of seeing the Aurora Borealis, which we did on three nights, and the South Coast, where these glacier pictures were taken. We also wanted to experience the Westfjords region in winter, which was also spectacular. We rented an all wheel drive Subaru so we could have more freedom of movement and spontaneity than a bus tour allows, and we stayed in modest AirBnBs to keep down the costs. Except for a couple of meals at restaurants, we ate simply, buying from small grocery stores (and Costco!). Our biggest splurges were for two guided ice cave tours, in which a driver and guide using a SuperJeep 4wd vehicle takes visitors to really spectacular places that would otherwise not be accessible. Well worth it!
Most of my work is available as prints on metal or cotton rag paper. To see a large selection of my work go to leerentz.com.
Sometime around 10 p.m., the temperature edged down a degree, and the light rain took on a sharper edge. The cold drops stung a bit more, and the asphalt took on a glossy sheen. The Weather Channel had warned of freezing rain, and it was arriving right on schedule.
Branches began glistening in the headlights, as the cold rain polished every surface in a thin transparent layer of ice. As the night wore on, twigs of the lesser trees began snapping, sending a cascade of crystal to the ground. Power lines sparkled when touched by headlights.
Tree limbs were tugged by gravity as the relentless weight of crystalline water accumulated. As more rain fell and ran down the branches in little rivulets, icicles started to grow at the tips as the water froze faster than it could drip. By the wee hours, the icicles at the branch tips were one centimeter and growing. As the weight gradually sagged the branches, the icicles curved, always seeking gravity’s pull.
At 5:00 a.m., the first massive maple branch collapsed on a power line, blinking out the lights and heat of a hundred homes. Then a sycamore went down, then an elm, then a hickory. All over the region tree limbs fell in the forest, and nobody heard, but when a tree limb fell across the highway the sirens blared and the red lights of emergency vehicles sparkled eerily off the crystal forest.
Our power went out before dawn, and we awoke to a slightly chilled house. It would get ever colder over the next three days, as our veneer of civilization cracked under the weight of the ice.
Meanwhile, I took pictures.
This storm occurred in Michigan just before Christmas; I would like to thank the relatives who took in those of us without power and made the holidays special. After three days, power was restored.
To see thousands of my photographs in large file sizes for use in magazines or other printed materials or electronic media, go to my NEW website at Lee Rentz Photography or go to my Flickr Photostream.
Silk Frost, known more widely as Hair Ice, emerging like fine hair from alder branches; the tiny water droplets show the ice beginning to melt as the temperature rises (an alternate theory is that it is condensation from the photographer’s breathing on this cold morning)
Overnight our Olympic Peninsula skies cleared and the temperature plunged to 28°F. That isn’t very cold by midwestern standards, where this winter is bringing temperatures and wind chills far south of -20°F, but it was cold enough to create something extraordinary and beautiful that I have never seen before.
I walked down the hill to our house, and saw a bright white patch about the size of a discarded Kleenex, which is what I thought it was and I wondered who had been despoiling our yard. I went over to retrieve it, and discovered that it was actually a patch of ice that seemingly sprouted from the ground and looked to be made up of fine hairs of ice. I was curious what it was, and I looked around to see if there were any others. There was a bigger blob of the stuff at the end of an old branch, and then I saw a couple more.
Each of the above formations was growing from alder wood
This was a cold morning, so there was frost on the Sword Ferns and grasses around our house, but frost has an entirely different look from this hairy ice. I showed Karen, and we agreed that all these patches of hairy ice were sprouting from old branches that were either on the ground or sticking up in the air. It was distinctly different from the frost flowers we’ve seen emerging from the frozen ground around here, which are thicker and look like they are extruded.
I photographed the formations, then used the internet to try and discover more about them. It turns out that these formations are quite rare, and have mostly been observed on the Olympic Peninsula and nearby Vancouver Island, and in parts of Europe. The consensus name is Hair Ice, though the names Frost Beard, Ice Wool, Feather Frost, Silk Frost (my favorite), and Cotton Candy Frost have also been used.
I don’t keep my yard very neat, especially in the wild patches beyond the mowed lawn and planted rhododendrons. If an alder branch falls in the forest, I’m not likely to hear it and will usually just let it be; as a naturalist, I prefer the chaos of the natural forest to the tidy landscaping around most homes. And that chaos of fallen branches is key to growing Hair Ice.
All of the Hair Ice around here was sprouting from old and decaying branches of Red Alder, a brittle tree that sheds body parts whenever we get snow or freezing rain. But where could the water be coming from that forms these hairs, which look to be as fine as human hair? This has actually been a mystery for a long time, though a German scientist described a possible association between fungus and Hair Ice in 1918. That scientist, Professor Alfred Wegener, became better known for his imaginative and long-controversial theory of Continental Drift, which has become a keystone theory to understanding the geological history of the Earth.
In 2008, two European scientists published a paper called “Hair Ice on Rotten Wood of Broadleaf Trees–a Biophysical Phenomenon.” In this paper they described their tested theory of how Hair Ice is formed. It turns out that fungus is indeed the key, and the Olympic Peninsula is renowned for its fungi. As we all know, fungus in fallen branches is responsible for recycling the nutrients in the wood, and this forest citizen takes its recycling responsibility very seriously. The fungus sets up a factory deep inside the branch, where it sets about decomposing carbohydrates and lipids–just as humans attempt to do with their New Year’s resolutions.
The fungus feasts on the nutrients, leaving water and carbon dioxide gas as waste products (hey, I would drink the carbonated water, but what do I know in comparison with a fungus?). And this is the key: the carbon dioxide forms pressure within the decaying twig that pushes the water outward through microscopic openings in the wood called rays. When the supercooled water meets the freezing temperatures outside, the water freezes into a tiny crystaline structure. Then, as the crystal is pushed by the water behind it, and the emerging water subsequently freezes, hair-like crystalline structures form that appear to be finer than the diameter of human hair. Together, the phenomenon looks a bit like white hairs emerging from an older person’s scalp–though I wish I could sprout that much hair from my bald head.
We had a stretch of three days of clear nights and freezing temperatures, My photography activities on the first morning had destroyed the fragile formations, and I wasn’t quite satisfied with the pictures, so I hoped to see the phenomenon repeated on the next morning. I awoke to 26°F temperatures, went outside, and saw new Hair Ice at each of the places it had been the day before. I spent a couple more hours photographing, until temperatures rose above freezing and the ice began to melt. The next day, temperatures went down to about 28° overnight, and I repeated the process; once again, the Hair Ice showed up in exactly the same spots. It was wondrous to see something entirely new to us.
Living here on a small patch of forest on the Olympic Peninsula has taught me so much. I’ve seen Flying Squirrels coming to our bird feeders and entering our birdhouses. We have Mountain Beavers living in burrows amongst our ferns; though we’ve never seen one, we see the neatly clipped fern fronds outside their burrows (these are a Pacific Northwest mammal not closely related to the regular Beaver). Last spring I photographed three kinds of salamanders that were living in rotten wood around our property (thanks again to my messy naturalist’s aesthetic). I’ve photographed Bald Eagles, River Otters, Douglas Squirrels, Black-tailed Deer, Western Screech-Owls, and numerous other species here. The gifts of wild land continue to be a source of inspiration in our lives.
The Bigleaf Maple and Red Alder and Douglas Fir and Western Red Cedar forest here has taught me a lot, and I like to keep it as wild as possible as a thank you to all the creatures who call this place home. The Silk Ice reminded me once again of how nature continues to amaze and delight.
For more information about Hair Ice, here are two sources, though for the latter you will need to know German, though an Abstract is in English:
UPDATE: About a month later, there have been three more times when Silk Ice has appeared on the same branches in my yard as before; in each case, the overnight temperature dipped to the mid to upper 20s. On two of the days, the formations were well-developed and I took new photographs, but on the other day, there was wind and I think that most of the ice had sublimated away, leaving only one patch hugging the ground, where the wind couldn’t get to it.
On another day, the conditions would seem to have been perfect, with no wind and temperatures below freezing, yet no ice developed. The problem was, the temperature had dipped to 19°F, which was apparently too low for the fungal decomposition to proceed, so water and carbon dioxide could not be produced.
To see my web site, which includes photographic prints for sale, please go to LeeRentz.com (just ask to email you a small version of a particular photograph you like if you can’t find it on the site; my website is not up to date).
To see thousands of my photographs in large file sizes for use in magazines or other printed materials or electronic media, go to my NEW website at Lee Rentz Photography or go to my Flickr Photostream.
Karen Rentz snowshoeing through a forest of trees coated with rime ice
Avalanche danger was in the orange to red zone–a high probability of snowy terror and a warning to watch for unattended snowpacks and to be prepared to take action if there were suddenly loud sounds. Terror indeed!
Still, it had been a long winter, with a lot of dangerous weekends in the mountains. We had the special kind of cabin fever that comes only from months of rainy winter Puget Sound weather, when we either turn into lethargic slugs or go screaming madly into the rain.
Weather forecasters back in early autumn predicted a La Niña winter, which would bring colder and wetter conditions to the Pacific Northwest. Nature obliged. Our rain gauge for 2011, so far, was over 20 inches and the snowpack in the mountains was getting thicker by the day. The problem was that there had been alternate patterns of sun, rain, and extreme cold in the mountains, which caused the layers of the snowpack to be unstable (think of a layer cake with the top layer, lubricated by a thin layer of Cool Whip and Jello, avalanching onto the floor in a ’60s sitcom). The avalanche danger everywhere in the mountains was extremely high, weekend after weekend.
We finally decided to head for Hurricane Ridge in Olympic National Park, avalanche danger be damned! Hurricane Ridge is known for treacherous weather and deep snow, so we checked out the forecast, the webcam, and the avalanche danger web sites, and decided that we would be OK if we were careful. The drive to the ridge is about 140 miles from our home, so we left early in the morning, carrying tire chains and extra food and warm clothing.
There was no snow in Port Angeles, gateway to the Olympics, but as we headed up the road, we encountered the first snowbanks and it gradually got thicker as we rose in elevation. Finally, we turned the corner onto Hurricane
Rime ice on the subalpine trees, viewed through icicles on the Hurricane Ridge Visitor Center
Ridge, and saw what we had specifically hoped to see: rime ice coating all the conifer trees, making each tree look like it had been created in a fantasy workshop.
Our northwestern conifers are adapted to winters where the accumulated snow seemingly gets as hard and heavy as concrete. The shape of our subalpine firs and spruces, for example, is tall and slender. Longer branches would break off in the heavy snow, so these species have short branches.
Rime ice is a special kind of ice that forms at windy, high elevations. Water droplets in the atmosphere, at temperatures between -4 and +14°F, become supercooled, staying in liquid form until hurtled against an object. Upon striking that object, the supercooled water suddenly freezes solid. The result? Danger, in the case of an airplane. Beauty, in the case of a subalpine forest.
Rime ice on a weather and radio station; note how the ice crystals grow in straight lines out from the metal of the structure and into the prevailing winds
We had never examined rime ice close up before, and we found that it has a distinct pattern. It grows outward from say, a branch, in a long structure that resembles an opaque crystal (I’m not sure if it technically would be considered a crystal). These linear structures can be over a foot long, and face into the wind. As long as the wind carries supercooled water and as long as the wind comes from the same direction, the formations grow outward in a straight line.
Yet rime ice is not soft like snow, despite its fantasyland appearance. It is hard to the touch; when we tapped it with ski poles, it made a rapping sound rather than collapsing like snow would do. And rime ice only occurred at the places along the ridge where wind would funnel. In the forest just below the open ridge, there was no rime ice (and little snow) on the trees. Interesting stuff indeed!
Looking downslope from Hurricane Ridge: the higher trees are entirely coated with rime ice, while the slightly lower trees have much less ice
Karen and I snowshoed through the rime ice forest along the ridge, taking care to avoid cornices at the tops of cliffs and to avoid steep, avalanche-prone slopes. All the alpine skiers, cross-country skiers, snowshoers, and even a woman in high heels were having a good time on Hurricane Ridge. Well, except, perhaps, for the woman coming down off the slope borne by a snowmobile, whose leg was in a splint. Perhaps she later sought help from Dr. Gouge, an orthopaedic surgeon from Port Angeles who had a sign advertising his services on the side of a van parked at Hurricane Ridge.
The snow depth gauge on Hurricane Ridge measured 14 feet of snow
Olympic National Park is among the few national parks with an alpine ski area; a rope tow leads to the ridge
Note the record snowfall and the accumulated snow this winter (much more has fallen since)
Snow level rising on the windows of the Visitor Center
Tall, thin conifers are the rule here; a tree with a lot of wide branches would pick up too heavy a snow load, and branches would break
Karen Rentz snowshoeing into the rime ice forest
Rime ice coated the structure of this walkway window outside the Visitor Center
Another view showing thick accumulation of rime ice
Young men marveling at and photographing the rime ice
Looking north from Hurricane Ridge toward the Strait of Juan de Fuca and Vancouver Island in the distance
Wave shape of a cornice atop a cliff on Hurricane Ridge
A pair of conifers covered with ice
Lone tree coated with ice; with a view of the Olympic Range
To see my web site, which includes photographic prints for sale, please go to LeeRentz.com
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A plant covered in ice formed from the spray of a mountain stream
Clear autumn nights bring freezing temperatures to the high country, which adorns tarns and mountain streams with fanciful shapes sculpted in ice. In this series of photographs, taken in Canada’s Yoho National Park, I photographed these ice patterns and sculptures, many showing a touch of autumn color.
In recent years there has been a creative explosion of glass sculpture by Seattle’s Dale Chihuly and other artists. With vivid colors and decorative surface textures, these human creations have a clear precedent in the ice sculptures found in nature.
The following photographs show plants encased in ice along a mountain stream. The tumbling stream sends up a fine spray of clear water that coats the plants in an ever-thickening blanket during the night–until the sun melts the ice as the morning progresses.
These photographs were taken of a mountain tarn (small pond), which had frozen over the night before. The patterns of ice crystals on the surface were projected by the sun onto the shallow bed of the pond, creating some unexpected textures and patterns on the rocky bottom.
The next group shows the surface of a tiny pool that had frozen over, with large crystal splinters of ice covering most of the pond’s five foot long surface. Several of the photographs show tiny autumn leaves trapped under the ice.
Finally, the following photograph is of snow surrounding a rock. Sunlight had warmed the rock, melting the snow immediately around it, revealing a fringe of exquisite and tiny autumn leaves.
For information about Yoho National Park, go to Yoho.
To see my web site, which includes photographic prints for sale, please go to LeeRentz.com.
To see thousands of my photographs in large file sizes for use in magazines or other printed materials or electronic media, go to my PhotoShelter Website.
Lee Rentz Photography Journal 