Melting snow, spring rains, gather in hollows of the forest floor to form ephemeral pools important for the development of amphibian life.
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Vernal Pool with Vinca Vine
Also named vernal pools, from the Latin word for spring or the time of the equinox. The pools are ephemeral in the sense of being temporary, disappearing in the warmer, dryer late spring and summer months, a characteristic important for amphibian live in being devoid of predatory fish.
Here the pool forms on a flat beneath the walls of Enfield Gorge. Here is another photograph featuring the ephemeral winter theme, “The Cave.”
These shots were hand held. I used a Sony Alpha 700 dslr with a variable “zoom” lens, great for framing compositions.
Robert H. Treman New York State Park.
Sources: Wikipedia, “Vernal Pool” and Merriam Webster online.
Click for a slideshow of a few photographs published recently.
Gully I 
Gully II Vernal Pool with Vinca Vine
Michael, I appreciate your teaching with this post. I will keep this in mind when I experience spring again with my nature walks.
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Very interesting photographs. On first glance, I thought I was seeing a beige outcropping of rock with traces of snow, but then I realized it was a pond reflecting light, trees, and blue sky. Now my eye alternates between the two images I have in my mind. Although I know it’s a pond, I can still see it as a large beige face of rock. It’s funny how our eyes and minds can play tricks on us.
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I took a second look, Janet, and see your initial impression, the water is still and a mirror, the shape of reflected sunlit trees is a cone-shaped beige rock.
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