©Bert Gildart: New England, Arkansas and the South are often touted as being some of the nation’s best sites for reveling in the splendor of fall, but I’d like to add another site and that is Montana, particular those places west of the Continental Divide.

For the past few weeks we’ve been traveling in our RV throughout these regions, and seldom have I seen the colors so brilliant. That observation was even further dramatized several days ago when I joined two good friends on a fishing expedition.

Early that morning we launched Bill’s (described in an early blog–and in newspaper and magazine stories–as a Fishing Fool ) boat in Swan Lake, located along the Seeley Swan Highway just south of Bigfork, and as we did, fog was rising and blending with the colors of the Swan Range.

SPECIES SYNCHRONIZATION

That in itself was dramatic, but combine that with the yellows of cottonwoods and aspens, and then add yet further the gold of tamaracks, and you’ve got an incredible palette of colors.

Montana doesn’t always have such color synchronizations, but this year, because of the right combination of temperature and moisture, aspens and cottonwoods have turned a bit later and tamaracks have turned a bit sooner.

That doesn’t always happen.

Nature then had combined to provide a perfect blend of colors, but the drama of the scene was further enhanced but the stillness of the lake, providing an almost perfect mirror-like reflection.

Fishing was our intended objective, but as a hard core photographer I was more inclined to point my camera in the direction of color than my pole toward the lake. As I result I didn’t do as well as my two friends, both of whom caught pike.

In fact, though I did fish after the fog had lifted and a slight wind began to blow, I didn’t catch a thing. Bill caught a small pike and so did Gene, but because of the size, both returned their catches.

Later, we all agreed that it wasn’t the fishing rather the fall foliage that had created such a memorable day.

This entry was posted on Sunday, October 21st, 2007 at 9:28 am and is filed under Montana Photography, Natural History/Conservation. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.