Quite often when we want to take a picture of a beautiful flower other blossoms in the background clutter up the view. Our eyes are so attuned to the one flower we don't realize the camera will not be able...
Sunnylands is a conference Center and gardens near Palm Springs, California. It was established by Walter and Leanore Annenberg to "address serious issues facing the nation and the world community" and has been a meeting site for Presidents, corporate executives,...
No, this is not a gardening tip on how to prune trees, it is about careful cropping of a photograph. I have been photographing these 'Liset' Crabapple trees for many years. They are centrally located in the San Francisco Botanical...
The California Redbud trees (Cercis occidentalis) are in bloom at UC Davis Arboretum. The Warren G. Roberts Redbud Collection along the Putah Creek path that winds through the Arboretum is a fantastic testimony to this California native tree. Redbuds are...
I often think of a photo composition as a combination of shapes linked together, like jigsaw puzzle pieces within the rectangle of the camera view finder. I call this blocking, borrowing a term from theatre production where the director organizes...
Winter is Camellia time at San Francisco Botanical Garden. The garden is renowned for its flowering magnolias this time of year but any visitor looking for winter flowers cannot miss the Camellias either. These large flowering evergreen shrubs have their own...
It is great to hang out with activists. My friend Judy Adler has almost single handedly created a new California initiative, Proposition 72 on the November ballet, that will help gardeners with water conservation. The Rain Water Capture Bill will...
It is the middle of winter, so it must be time for the Magnolias to be flowering in San Francisco Botanical Garden. The winter flowering deciduous Magnolias are a huge feature here, with one of the largest collections in the...
I have been visiting Leaning Pine Arboretum for years, and it has become one of my favorite gardens. For a California garden photographer, seeking landscape settings for mature, appropriate plants adapted to the summer-dry climate, Leaning Pine is near perfect....
On winter mornings after rain, fog oozes from the earth. The cool air cannot hold all the moisture the ground wants to release, so it condenses waiting for the sun to warm the air and absorb the floating dew. If the...
