Photo Blog - Niebrugge Images

Font’s Point, Anza-Borrego Desert State Park, California.

We have been working our way through the adjusting, key-wording and finally adding our photos from our last trip to our website.  We just updated our section of Anza-Borrego photos from our time spent there this spring.

We now have a lot of coverage of this beautiful desert, too bad few people outside of Southern California have heard of the place.  Heck, I come across people in So Cal who haven’t heard of it - but then again, the relatively low visitors numbers is one of the things I like about the place.

This plant seems to have many names and uses.  Some call it Thorn-Apple, or Sacred Datura, or even Jimson Weed.  The entire plant is poisonous, but portions of the plant are used in modern pharmaceuticals for things like motion sickness medication and to counteract muscle spasms.  Not surprisingly, Native Americans were also aware of the many medicinal benefits of this plant. 

It is about the only thing blooming in Anza-Borrego right now, this plant will bloom most the summer.  We should be back in Alaska Saturday night, it will be a little while before flowers begin blooming there. (more…)

Actually this is a jackrabbit, so maybe I should have titled this Silly Wack-wabbit.

Seems like at the end of a trip we start evaluating our travel plans and methods.  Our trips outside Alaska to the Lower 48 have typically been fairly long trips for a couple of reasons. (more…)

These cool elephant looking animals are actually metal sculptures of gomphotherium.  These guys actually used to roam in the Anza-Borrego area 3.7 million yeas ago - the gomphotherium, not the sculptures.  :)  (more…)

Borrego Palm Canyon, Anza-Borrego.

This was from a beautiful Monday morning - it was completely calm!  Nice treat after the weekend storm that ironically originated in Alaska.

We had a great month in Anza-Borrego, it was fascinating watching the transformation of the desert as the wildflowers bloomed.  We were very fortunate to visit during one of Borrego’s famous wildflower years. 

Right now we are in Tucson, Arizona for a couple of days to take care of some business, then we are spending a month outside of Phoenix, Arizona for more photography.

Brittlebush wildflowers in Anza-Borrego Desert State Park, California.

This was from a couple of hours ago.  It may not be obvious in this small size, but that is fresh snow on the tops of the mountains!  Hard to believe, but just a few days ago, it was in the upper 80’s!

Here you can see additional photos of Anza Borrego Desert State Park.

I really like this small, colorful ground flower that is very thick in some areas of Anza-Borrego.  For this photo, I placed an extension tube on my 17-35 lens.  I set the lens at 17mm and f/22 and then laid my camera amongst the flowers and started firing away.  It was fun to see what I was getting - I would check images on the back of the camera, and try again.  The extension tube allows for very close focus.  The flowers in focus are less than an inch away.

This was from a couple of days ago.  Unfortunately, hard winds have made the last couple of days unproductive for photography, I feel bad for all the people who came out here to see the amazing bloom.

Update:  It is actually raining fairly steady Saturday evening.  Few things in life smell as good as a fresh rain in the desert!

Desert wildflowers in Coyote Canyon, Anza Borrego. 

It is pretty cool that the Desert Sand Verbena and Dune Evening Primrose grow together, they are a perfect combination.

For more:  Anza-Borrego Desert State Park photos.

About 4 miles up Coyote Canyon, Anza-Borrego State Park, California.

When the TV cameras start showing up to provide morning feeds to news shows, you know it must be a great year for wildflowers in Anza-Borrego, and very near peak.  It is both!

The fields along Henderson Canyon Road, and Coyote Canyon beginning at the north end of Digiorgio Road have to be two of the best areas.  Both these locations are in Borrego Springs and contain endless fields of wonderful colors.  It is an amazing site to see, and unlike anything you would normally see in the desert.  The photo below is from Coyote Canyon this a.m.

If I lived anywhere near this wonderful event, I would get on my horse, drive my car, or even ride the neighbor’s broken bike - whatever it took to get down here to experience this fairly rare show before it is too late.  It has been three years since it last looked like this, who knows when it may happen again.

Now for the bad news.  The weekends are very crowed in this little town, so bring your patience.  The other bummer - it looks like a big storm might be hitting this Saturday or Sunday.  During the week is the best time to visit, but it is still worth fighting the crowds and weather if you can only come on the weekends.

Southwestern Barrel Cactus.

Kinda lost in this small size is a wonderful ring of flowers on the top of this cactus.  Captured with a Canon tilt / shift lens.

Desert Sunflowers or Desert Gold, along Henderson Canyon Road, Anza-Borrego Desert State Park, California.  This is looking up toward Coyote Canyon at sunset.

In 2005, when I heard about the amazing desert bloom, I quickly caught a flight from Alaska and lived out of a rental car for 6 weeks as I traveled around the and photographed the Desert Southwest.  The one place I was sorry to have missed seeing were the fields of Desert Sunflowers on Henderson Canyon Road - By the time I got down here in February, a rainstorm had pretty much wiped them out.

So when we arrived in Borrego 3 weeks ago, this was the first place I went.  But 3 weeks ago, there wasn’t a single flower in this field, it was all green.  It really has undergone an amazing transformation in the past couple of weeks, mostly in just the past week.

The best news; most of the plants have one, maybe two blooms, and about five buds ready to bloom, so I think it is going to get even better in the days to come!

It is interesting how the timing of the bloom varies from year to year.  In 2005, this area was wonderful during the first couple of weeks of February, this year it will be an entire month later. 

Desert Lily

The Desert Lily is a popular wildflower that can be hard to find, but not this year in Anza-Borrego, they are numerous.  I have seen the flower, or at least the plant throughout the Park - there are even some growing in the Pumpkin Patch!

Hellhole Canyon, Anza-Borrego Desert State Park, California.

The desert floor along the mountains is getting some wonderful carpets of flowers right now.  The Purplemat seen here along with the Yellow Woolly-Daisy are extremely colorful right now.

Wildflowers at sunset in Anza Borrego Desert State Park, California.  This is a few miles East of Borrego Springs on Highway S22.

For this photo, I used a 3 stop hard-edge graduated neutral density filter on a Canon tilt / shift lens.

Desert Sand Verbena, Anza-Borrego Desert State Park, California.

The weather has warmed up here into the low 80’s this week.  We had rain in 3 of our first 8 days here, and now the warm weather seems to have jumped started the wildflowers, they are suddenly showing in many more places now.  I think the next week or two should be pretty good.

Pumpkin Patch, Anza-Borrego Desert State Park, California.

This is such an interesting, almost lunar like place.  I waited until after sunset and the lite the pumpkins with a flash light during a 30 second exposure.  I have wanted to try this technique at this location for some time - it just seemed appropriate for some reason.

I stumbled upon this guy on my way to photograph sunset, look at the size of that camera!  It captures a 20 x 24 inch image.

 I was in a hurry, and I didn’t want to pester the guy as he set up, but I had to ask a few questions. (more…)

Costa’s Hummingbird Nest.

 I thought I would stick with the bird theme.  This hummingbird is tiny!  According to Sibley, it is one of our smallest birds - it weighs in at 3.5 grams.  I shot this right at sunrise with a 600, plus 2x converter, plus extension tubes and still couldn’t fill the frame.

You can see this little gal right outside the Anza-Borrego Visitor Center.  Employees roped off the area surrounding the nest after a dog started sniffing near the nest; that does make finding the bush with the nest a lot easier, look for the barriers.

Anna’s Hummingbird Nest. 

I found this nest a few days ago.  I must admit, I couldn’t help but think of her during the night as the wind blew and the rain came down.  I can’t imaging how much the branches most have been moving around as she sat there keeping the two little jellybean sized eggs warm.   

They have a fourteen day incubation period, I look forward to seeing the chicks.