标签美国下的文章

优胜美地国家公园中的春季瀑布 Vernal Fall in Yosemite National Park, California (© elvistudio/Shutterstock)

National Parks Week begins

To kick off National Park Week, which starts today, we're turning our lens on Vernal Fall in California's Yosemite National Park. This time of year, the waterfall flows in a torrent, but by late summer it can be reduced to a trickle of small streams slipping over the edge. Most years, Vernal Fall is at full power by May, as the spring thaw in the mountains melts the snowpack, turning the falls into a raging tumble of water spilling to the valley floor where the Merced River flows.

阿卡迪亚国家公园，缅因州 Acadia National Park in Maine (© emptyclouds/Getty Images)

'The Crown Jewel of the North Atlantic'

Welcome to Acadia National Park on Maine's rocky, scenic coast. The 49,075-acre park covers about half of Mount Desert Island, smaller nearby islands, and a section on the mainland. The oldest national park east of the Mississippi River and the only one in Maine, Acadia packs a lot of geographical variety into its relatively small size. You'll find miles of craggy coastline like the shore in our homepage image, woodlands, wetlands, and mountains. The park's Cadillac Mountain is the highest point along the North Atlantic seaboard and a great spot to take in the sunrise.

人们在布雷纳德的加尔湖上冰钓，明尼苏达州 People ice fishing on Gull Lake in Brainerd, Minnesota (© Robert Benson/Cavan)

An icy extravaganza

We’re just outside of Brainerd, Minnesota, for the Ice Fishing Extravaganza on Gull Lake. Each year in late January, more than 10,000 people will come out to catch as many fish as they can—mostly walleye and northern pike, but all fish species are eligible. The contest is organized and run by volunteers exclusively, and 100 percent of the proceeds—around $150,000—goes to local charities.

The practice of ice fishing started years ago when Native American tribes in the Upper Midwest would use it to gather food for the long, harsh winters. But today, ice fishing is a popular winter activity in the Land of 10,000 Lakes. Some anglers even trick out modern-day ice shanties with big-screen TVs, underwater cameras, sonar fish-finders, and bathrooms with hot showers, making it easy to spend entire weekends out on the lake, warm and dry.

一只勃兰特鸬鹚在洛杉矶海岸石油钻塔下的一群太平洋鲭鱼中觅食，加利福尼亚 A Brandt's cormorant hunts for a meal in a school of Pacific mackerel beneath an oil rig off the coast of Los Angeles, California (© Alex Mustard/Minden Pictures)

A seabird gets 'schooled'

This deep-diving Brandt's cormorant appears to be on the hunt for a meal, and there's plenty of Pacific mackerel to choose from here off the coast of Los Angeles, California. While seabirds like the cormorant are a threat to these fish, the mackerel aren't exactly defenseless. Fish have many unique means of defense, such as traveling in dense schools like this one. It's a technique that not only allows for speedy travel (because it reduces friction on most of the fish in the school)—schooling also makes it more difficult for predators to pick out an individual victim. For these fish, there's safety in numbers. But when all else fails, they can take some advice from Dory in 'Finding Nemo'—'Just keep swimming, just keep swimming.'

穆尔森林国家纪念碑，加利福尼亚州旧金山 Muir Woods National Monument, San Francisco, California (© Mia2you/Shutterstock)

Into the woods

On this day in 1908, President Theodore Roosevelt declared 554 acres in Marin County, California, a national monument. William and Elizabeth Kent, who donated the land, insisted the monument be named after naturalist John Muir, the environmentalist known as the 'father of the national parks.' Part of the Golden Gate National Recreation Area, Muir Woods is best known for its old-growth coastal redwood forests, which make up more than half its land. The redwoods in the monument are 600-800 years old, on average, with the oldest being at least 1,200. The tallest tree is about 258 feet, though further north redwoods grow as high as 379 feet. Redwoods are an important part of the forest ecosystem. They absorb and 'strip' moisture from fog, which then drips into the ground, supporting the trees as well as other forest life.

'Field of Light at Sensorio,' by Bruce Munro, Paso Robles, Calif. (© George Rose/Getty Images)

'Field of Light at Sensorio' by Bruce Munro

Artist Bruce Munro was camping at Ayers Rock in Australia with his family in 1992 when he envisioned the art installation on today's homepage. Titled 'Field of Light,' it's currently on display at a venue called Sensorio in Paso Robles, California, the latest stop in a tour of sites around the world. At Sensorio, a new arts center that bills itself as representing 'the intersection of art, technology and nature,' visitors will find 58,800 solar-powered spheres, lit by optical fibers, that change color. When the sun sets, the fibers illuminate, creating a shimmering, interactive landscape in the meadow. The art installation changes a bit at each destination, but Munro tells reporters, 'the one constant is that it does make people smile.'

图森附近索诺兰沙漠中的巨柱仙人掌，亚利桑那州 Saguaro cacti in the Sonoran Desert near Tucson, Arizona (© Jack Dykinga/Minden Pictures)

Sky island views

Though it's December, it isn't cold and snowy everywhere in North America. Here, near Tucson, Arizona, the Sonoran Desert stays warm year-round. In this photo, we're looking at a 'sky island'—an isolated, high-elevation woodland surrounded by radically different lowland environments. In this case, the desert land at the base of the mountain is peppered with saguaros—a stately cactus recognized for its long arms. The snow-capped Santa Catalina Mountains in the distance are part of the Madrean Sky Islands and are home to Mount Lemmon Sky Valley, which is the southernmost ski destination in the US. The ski area covers the slopes of Mount Lemmon, which reaches 9,150 feet at the summit and gets about 180 inches of snow annually.

Did they forget to fly south?

Native to North America, trumpeter swans live near rivers, lakes, and coastal byways in northern and western US states in the lower 48, as well as in Canada and Alaska. Depending on where they live, these swans are either resident birds or medium-range migrators. What they all require, though, is open water during winter, since their diet consists almost entirely of aquatic plants. That may be why the swans in this image are drawn to the waters of Kelly Warm Springs in Wyoming, which won't freeze even as snow lines the banks.

Trumpeters are the largest living species of waterfowl in North America. The biggest known cob—that's a male swan--weighed almost 40 pounds and had a wingspan of 10 feet. Although in the early 20th century they came perilously close to extinction, today there's an estimated 35,000 trumpeters. Even with the tremendous recovery, it remains illegal to hunt them. And yes, their calls do sound like trumpets, but Miles Davis they aren't. Click below to listen.

Winter at Valley Forge

Valley Forge, Pennsylvania, is the site of the winter encampment of the Continental Army under General George Washington. On December 19, 1777, about 12,000 soldiers and 400 women and children started to build 1,500 log huts where they would live for the next six months. At the time, the British were occupying the patriot capital of Philadelphia, just a day's march away. Already two and a half years into the war, troops knew the harsh winter would stop the fighting, allowing them to organize and avoid mobilizing for several months. Life, however, was still challenging as they lacked funds for fresh food and clothing. There were no battles at Valley Forge, but nearly 2,000 people died from disease during the encampment.

Washington's leadership was being questioned by some members of the Continental Congress after losing two key battles, and the encampment gave him a chance to regroup. Some have called Valley Forge the birthplace of the American Army, as concepts like basic training started there. In June, the army left Valley Forge, and while the war wasn't won until 1783, many consider the encampment to be a turning point on the way to victory.

Wild and beautiful Alaska

In honor of Alaska National Parks Day, we're traveling to Kenai Fjords National Park—home of the awe-inspiring Exit Glacier seen here. The park sits at the edge of the North Pacific Ocean where frequent winter storms dump the snow that feeds this land of ice. The Harding Icefield crowns the park with at least 38 flowing glaciers—one of which is Exit Glacier. Exit Glacier is known for being one of the most-visited of Alaska's glaciers, likely because it’s accessible via the Seward Highway. In mid-November, the road to the glacier closes due to heavy snowfall, so visitors can only get there via snow-friendly transportation like dogsled or cross-country skis.

Kenai Fjords is just one of Alaska's eight national parks, which together boast the nation’s largest glacial system, incredible wildlife viewing, and North America’s tallest peak. These parks exist in part because of the Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act, which President Jimmy Carter signed into law on this day in 1980. It converted massive tracts of Alaskan wilderness into protected land, doubling the amount of national park land in the state. For that, we are grateful. Alaska may be cold, but it sure is beautiful and worth protecting.

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