Flowers and Ribbons of Ice

摘要

Dragging yourself out of a warm bed in the early hours of a wintry morning to go for a hike in the woods: It's not an easy thing for some to do, but the visual treasures that await could be well worth the effort. If the weather conditions and the local flora are just right, you might come across fleeting, delicate frozen formations sprouting from certain plant stems, literally a garden of ice. I first came across such natural ice sculptures in December 2003 while hiking in Tennessee. I couldn't explain what I saw until I did a Web search, but a year later I found similar frozen formations, in a different area and associated with another plant.