From Clouds Rest

Yosemite in December

What can you say?

Table Mountain

There are a few different "Table Mountains" in California, but the one I visited for the first time yesterday is near Jamestown in Tuolumne County. It is a plateau formed by volcanic rock. The top features vernal pools that– at least after a nice wet winter like this one– generate a riot of wildflowers. The Wikipedia entry explains the fascinating geology:

Table Mountain is an inverted valley, an elevated landform which follows the former contours of a river valley above level of the surrounding topography, rather than below it. It was created by lava flows which filled an ancient river bed. The resulting igneous rock resisted erosion better than the materials around it, leaving behind a sinuous rock formation elevated above the surrounding landscape.

I was there for the flowers, but the views are spectacular too– to the west, New Melones reservoir, and to the east, in the distance Yosemite's still snowy peaks and directly below, somewhat less appealingly, the Chicken Ranch casino, the surrounding oaks and grassland glowing green.

The dominant flowers on top are lupines, butter-and-eggs, goldfield, and clover. A very special place this time of year.

Mountaintop madness

Of all the creatively awful ways humans have figured out for messing up the natural environment, mountaintop removal coal mining may be the most appalling and senseless. Of course, we have managed to mess things up on a massive scale many times before: deforestation of large portions of whole continents is a good example. But amazingly, trees and forests grow back: witness the northeastern United States. Mountaintops do not grow back, except possibly on a geologic time scale. And adding insult to violent injury, the mining spoils kill the streams, and the coal itself has a second and even a third round opportunity to kill the planet: globally through CO2 emissions, and locally through coal ash disposal. I guess there are people who look at pictures like these and can only see dollar signs; others turn away and see votes. Now and then somebody stands up and does the right thing...