Although it mostly wasn’t super cold while I was in New Mexico, there were still some interesting ice formations to be found in the mountains, particularly around streams. This was partly because it was colder the higher in the mountains you got, but also because the temperature differences between day and night were more extreme there.
This is what happens when a waterfall freezes (partially, anyway). Though you can’t really see it in a still photo, there was water flowing a bit behind this wall of ice.This is the center of the waterfall in the previous photo. It was still flowing through the center, but there was a chunk of ice in the middle of the flowing part that looked a bit like an explosion of ice, which was causing the liquid water to splash around pretty wildly. It’s kind of hard to tell in this photo what water is frozen and what water is just in active motion.This one’s a close up of the wall of ice in the first photo.I think this picture has interesting contrast with the smooth, rounded ice and frothy bubbles.More ice and bubbles.These icicle-like formations were on the underside of a log over a churned up bit of river. I’m guessing they formed from the spray of the river running to the bottom of the log and freezing before they could drip back down.I found these tiny ice formations on twigs after climbing up the same rock where I also found some of the lichens in my lichen post. I was pretty excited to find these, since I haven’t seen any ice formations quite like this at home. When I found these, and for quite a while afterwards, I wondered what the conditions were that made it possible for these to form. Recently, I stumbled across something that may be an explanation.Certain ice formations occur due to specific interactions with plants or fungi. I recently learned that there are a few different plant species that create ice formations when their sap freezes and bursts out of the sides of the stem, which is actually sort of what appears to be happening in this picture in particular… But on the other hand I wasn’t able to find information about any of these plants being in New Mexico. It would help if I could see this spot during the summer.Another angle of the tiny ice formation.A close up of the first ice formation.
