Dripping Down The Rivers
Fall color is dripping down the rivers through the central valley.
Color spotter Jim Adams provides a First Report from Knight’s Ferry where he attended the annual pumpkin roll to find riverside cottonwood and willows and walnut orchards at peak.
He reports that down the Stanislaus River in Oakdale, cottonwood and valley oak have yet to peak.
- Knights Ferry, Stanislaus River (213′) – Near Peak (50-75%) GO NOW!
Yosemite Is Still At It
Yosemite National Park is a progressive peak.
It begins in the high country, with pockets of aspen and willows turning, then descends to Yosemite Valley and along the Wawona Road with bigleaf maple and dogwood providing a colorful blend of hot pink and cadmium yellow.
Then, orange black oak and golden cottonwood complete the show from the week before Halloween through the first two weeks of November.
Clayton Peoples was there yesterday (Nov. 2) to confirm that “Yosemite Valley is still sporting peak conditions.”
- Yosemite Valley (4,000′) – Peak (75-100%) GO NOW!
Finding Gold in Rich Bar
It’s name speaks of its wealth … Rich Bar.
In the 1850s, Rich Bar in the Feather River Canyon attracted thousands of argonauts. Many never left. Gravemarkers, memorials and headstones tell a grim story of their fates.
Mining accident … drowned … illness … hanged for theft … murdered … stabbed … hanged for murder … accidental shooting … killed in duel … shot … gunshot suicide.
Plumas County color spotter Michael Beatley spent a day exploring his county’s historic places and came back with a few visual nuggets, though no real gold.
He reports that the oak and dogwood are still golden. Union Pacific tracks pass near Rich Bar along the Feather River, for those who enjoy combining rail and fall color photography.
- Rich Bar, Plumas County (2,402′) – Peak to Past Peak, GO NOW, YOU ALMOST MISSED IT.
Decent Color Declines
“Decent color is getting hard to find,” wrote Philip Reedy of a scouting trip he took through Plumas County. “Most of the color is gone.”
He was surprised, however, by the color surrounding Sardine Lake at 6,000′, from the black oak near Bassetts Station (CA-49) and enveloping the historic buildings at Kentucky Mine in Sierra City (now closed for the season).
And, to show his ride also promotes what he does, Phil – who photographs fly fishing – sent this image of his license plate.
- Plumas County – Past Peak, YOU MISSED IT.
Point Lobos Orange
It covers the trunks and branches of oaks and Monterey Cypress with an orange flocking.
Trentepohlia aurea is filamentous terrestrial green alga whose orange coloration comes from carotenoid pigments in its cells.
Susan Hanlon was visiting Point Lobos State Park on the Monterey Peninsula when she was impressed by its bold orange display.
Point Lobos is most famous for Trentepohlia, though the alga is commonly found in humid areas along the California coastline including the San Francisco Bay Areas, Great Britain and Ireland.
Although not technically an autumn color, it shares orange carotenoid pigments with autumn leaves.
FallClr
It’s the end of October. Time to put a new expiration sticker on the license plate and keep tabs of what color is peaking in the neighborhood (elev. 768′).
Yup, it’s all good.
Silverwood Turns Gold
Silverwood Lake in the San Bernardino Mountains is a great recreational destination, popular for water sports and for fishing rainbow trout, largemouth bass, striped bass, Channel catfish and bluegill.
Because the Silverwood Lake is lightly forested, it is not often reported for fall having much fall color. However, Silverwood’s cottonwood, oak and willows are now Near Peak to Peak.
The leading reason to head to Silverwood lake is its recreation, though for the moment, fall color will greet you warmly as it did color spotter Chien-Chang Kyle Chen, today.
- Silverwood Lake, San Bernardino Mountains (3,356′) Chien-Chang Kyle Chen – Near Peak to Peak (50-100%) GO NOW!
Caught and Released
Color spotter Lance Pifer lost track of how many of Yosemite’s wild rainbow trout he caught and released at 25.
The best place to net native rainbows is on the Merced River, below Yosemite Valley. A spot favored by park employees is the Cascade Creek picnic area above the Arch Rock entrance station. Walk downstream from the picnic area to find holes little fished by park visitors.
Lance was fishing on the South Fork of the Merced River, four miles upstream from the Wawona Hotel and Illilouette Creek which is a tributary of the Merced. He notes that some really big brown trout can be had on the south fork of the Merced above the main fork.
Other non-natives in the national park, include brook, golden and Lahontan cutthroat trout, but the rainbow are the only native trout.
Lance noted how amazing Yosemite was with color peaking and temperatures in the 80s. That’s changed since he visited. Daytime temperatures are now 40 degrees cooler.
Best valley fall color is now found among the black oak at Cooks Meadow, near Yosemite Falls.
- Yosemite Valley (4,000′) – Peak (75-100%) GO NOW!
El Rio de las Plumas
John Marsh and Jose Noriega were exploring Northern California in 1836, traveling up the Sacramento River in dugout canoes, when they came to a tributary to the Sacramento that was covered in feathers. They named the newly discovered tributary, El Rio de las Plumas, River of the Feathers.
The Feather River is one of California’s great waterways. Most impressively, it drops 4,350′ in its first 74 miles.
That makes it not only one of America’s most scenic rivers but also one of the most productive at generating hydroelectric power.
Pacific Gas & Electric Co., gets a good part of its energy from Feather River hydroelectric plants in a “stairway of power” that climbs from Lake Oroville to Mountain Meadows Reservoir, above Lake Almanor.
Along CA-70, a beautiful mix of fall color can be seen growing beside the river and the creeks that run into it. Willow, black oak, bigleaf maple, dogwood, grasses and Indian rhubarb are now at peak and reflecting their chartreuse, yellow, gold, orange and red colors in the river’s clear waters.
Feather River (10/29/19) Jeff Luke Titcomb Feather River (10/29/19) Jeff Luke Titcomb Feather River (10/29/19) Jeff Luke Titcomb Feather River (10/29/19) Jeff Luke Titcomb Feather River (10/29/19) Jeff Luke Titcomb Feather River (10/29/19) Jeff Luke Titcomb Feather River (10/29/19) Jeff Luke Titcomb Feather River (10/29/19) Jeff Luke Titcomb Feather River (10/29/19) Jeff Luke Titcomb Feather River (10/29/19) Jeff Luke Titcomb Feather River (10/29/19) Jeff Luke Titcomb Feather River (10/29/19) Jeff Luke Titcomb Howell’s Bridge, N Fork Feather River (10/29/19) Jeff Luke Titcomb
Plumas County color spotter Jeff Luke Titcomb drove down the canyon from Greenville to Beldon Town Resort.
We’ll let you in on a secret. Jeff didn’t make the trip just to scope out fall color. He treated himself to a cheeseburger at Beldon Town. Though, he did find peak fall color at Indian Creek, Feather Falls, Twain, Beldon Town and Howell’s Bridge, not to mention a scary jack o’lantern in the Beldon Town store.
- Feather River (CA-70) – Peak (75-100%) GO NOW!
Going, Going, Gone
The 50/50 Tree, so-called because – when first noticed by Robert Kermen – it appeared to be one tree that was half Just Starting and half Peaking, has now gone Past Peak.
After Kermen’s discovery, the tree was revealed by Jeff Luke Titcomb to be side-by-side mountain maples. However, we also learned that this phenomenon can happen in circumstances where the sunny side has peaked and the shaded side has not.
It’s another of the weird discoveries of Autumn 2019.