Sabino Canyon in Morning Light

Most of the desert scenery was bathed in full sunshine, but as I hiked into to the shadows of the canyon wall, I noticed this striking scene with rim lighting on the Saguaro Cacti. As I set up my tripod, I noticed the way the backlit layers of yellow and green desert shrubs framed the foreground in the lower left. “This will be my best photo of the day,” I said to myself.

This is a photo of the early morning light on the canyon: backlighting in the shadows cast rim light on the saguaro cacti.

This image also succeeds with its limited color palette. The interplay of yellow and shades of green unify the image, don’t you think?

Some Like It Hot

PITTSBURGH…Freeze warning tonight. Where did the summer go? Why can’t Indian summer last longer? Just last week, I was soaking up the warm sun at the New York Botanical Garden, admiring the cacti in the Conservatory.

The prickly texture and natural symmetry of this barrel cactus stands out in the sunlight at the New York Botanical Garden #NYBG.

Cactus or Street Sign?

This unusual cactus made me smile. With arms pointing horizontally north, south, east, west and a few other ways in between, I expected to see place names and distances written. ” It might say, “Miami – 103 miles,” or “Key West – 90 miles,” and “Cancun – 468 miles.”

Cactus at Naples Botanical Garden that resembles a multidirectional street sign. In fact, it is a rare Florida Semaphore cactus, because it resembles the semaphore signals of a railroad crossing.

I guess I’m more accustomed to cacti of other shapes like the saguaro cactus in the Sonoran Desert or the Cholla “Teddy Bear” Cactus of the high desert in Joshua Tree National Park. Perhaps you know the prickly pear cactus or the barrel cactus from your hikes in the Southwest United States. Say hello to the Florida Semaphore Cactus, or the Consolea Corallicola.