August and September, 2012, have been smoke-filled months in Lake County. Hundreds of thousands of wildland acres burned on the East, West and North sides of the lake. The fires burned right through the canopies of mountainside Blue Oak forests and even Valley Oak groves in the creek bottoms. The aftermath reveals a simple skeletal calligraphy of ghost woodlands.
Firefighters bulldozed many new firebreaks through the hills.
Ancient petrified lava flows were unmasked from beneath the covering forests.
There came a day when smoke blended with incoming clouds resulting in an afternoon sky which grew increasingly to resemble paintings of the Italian Renaissance.
As many as twenty Lesser Goldfinches clung to the thistle seed sock.
A mantid deity manifested on a south-facing barn wall in Upper Lake.
In the shade of The Great Oaks.
California quail in two coveys of twenty frequented the ranch.
Clear Lake at the mouth of the Rodman Slough.
As the sky filled with tinted mammiferous clouds, three White-tailed Kites seemed to revel in the splendor as they sailed before the rainbow.
