Well, here we are on the brink of autumn. It was a very enjoyable summer; spent in the garden, the North Dakota Badlands, and a little bit in Wyoming and Montana. I finally got to see Devil’s Tower, the Medicine Wheel, Jackson Hole,and Red Lodge. My art was well received at the Rider Gallery and the Dickinson [...]

Happy Thankgiving to everyone! May you have a wonderful day, wherever you are. I guess this Prairie Walker blog is a way to show what I’m thankful for throughout the year, here on the prairies of southwestern North Dakota. A quick flip through the pages reminds me of the beauty of Dakota that surrounds us from [...]

There aren’t many leaves still hanging from the branches of trees by now. I’ve enjoyed seeing their beauty as they have fallen on the earth and snow. The other day I came across these words by Henry David Thoreau, and thought they would be appropriate for one of the last leaves of the season. Every blade in [...]

We had a lovely, steady rain today, here on the plains. What a pleasure to be inside a warm house while the moisture drips, drips, drips onto a landscape that has been dry to the bone. View of the Backyard, with Raindrops on Window Late in the afternoon, the rain turned to snow. The first [...]

Just west of Marmarth, there’s a cowboy and a bucking horse made from welded steel. This country has a great heritage of ranching and rodeo life. Marmarth is host to a rodeo every summer on the 4th of July. There’s also a wonderful scenic road just west of Marmarth, that winds its way through the Badlands up [...]

Well, we’ve toured the cottonwood grove, and are heading west toward a low-water crossing over the Little Missouri River. The bank of the river is visible in the right background. I liked the fallen tree limb and the delicate branches of sagebrush in the foreground. Butte Cemetary Off to the south is a lovely little [...]

Cottonwood with Spin at 10 While cottonwood tree images were still fresh in my mind, I decided to experiment a little more last night. This post features some of the more extreme results of adding special filters. I made note of which filter was used, and to what degree, so that I will have some reference for [...]

THE COTTONWOOD GROVE Just down the road from the Little Missouri overlook, there is a wonderful grove of cottonwood trees. To me, cottonwoods have a special sort of presence. You really do have to look up to them, in more ways than one. It can’t be easy to attain a ripe old age out here on [...]

It was such a great day for pictures of the Little Missouri, that I meandered over to this stretch of the river to take in the views there as well. This area is just west of the previous section I photographed, and is known locally as the “wagon wheel” for the rounded gray cliff in [...]