Bare Essentials 6 - Basswood duo

Basswood trees fascinate me - they can become enormous trees with several trunks rising out of a central root mass. But it’s their leaves that are so wonderful - the first image is the regular leaf; the ones that gather light and turn it into sugar though the process of photosynthesis. The second is a specialized form of leaf called a bract which is attached to flowers that eventually turn to fruit and seeds. The curved bract sails and spins through the air and can be carried quite a distance from the parent tree. All in the name of seed dispersal.

Anyway…this is a look at both leaf types in the snow from a few days ago. They were found just a few feet apart on the trail and may be from the same tree, or not. The texture of the snow was pretty cool as the flakes started to clump together in tiny snowballs.

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More minimalist snow stuff…fire away.

Technical Details

Is this a composite: No
Handheld for both

Lr processed for a lot of white boosting and exposure. Some white balance and careful control of texture and clarity in the leaves themselves.

Leaf -
image

Bract -
image

@the.wire.smith

I like them both, Kris. but the first one is awesome. No nits at all.

What David said! I especially love the shape of the first, echoed by the way the snow is clinging to it.

Thanks @David_Bostock & @Diane_Miller - the snow itself was really interesting that day - little balls of flakes instead of individual ones so the texture was cool. Basswood leaves are amazing, but hard to get after the snow flies because they are one of the early trees to drop leaves and they get buried in maple and oak leaves and then snow.

That’s what skiers call corn snow and it is glorious – but rare.