Category Archives: Windmills and Wells

We’ve got another man down, Dude

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In a friend’s backyard, no less! I was out poking around with my camera before dinner and enjoying the extremely rural Dakota atmosphere when I noticed something in the grass. Closer inspection revealed that it was a windmill head from the early 1900s. What is it with me and old windmills, anyway?

As a mountain and city kid, I don’t know why I find these artifacts so intriguing, but I do. I’ve joked from time to time that in North Dakota’s vast expanse of prairie, anything sticking up more than a few feet can be considered a landmark. More honestly, I think they have more of a connotation of the pioneer spirit, the hardiness that it takes to farm a section of North Dakota land. For every windmill there’s a story of someone who put it there. I suppose that’s the real fascination.

Rainy day road trip

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We were blessed with a steady soaker this weekend, with some places seeing up to two inches of rain. I had a really strong need to roam, so I threw my gear in the truck and headed out on some soggy, spongy dirt roads and trails. I saw some really cool stuff, grabbed a few satisfying photos, caught up on a few podcasts, and managed not to get stuck. In other words, a success.

The rain let up briefly when I grabbed this shot of a rough-looking windmill. The valley in the background is still slightly obscured by the rain, and just after I snapped this shot it picked up again. Thankfully I have lens hoods to keep the front element dry when I poke it out the window of the truck! Yes, I did get out and hoof it in the rain a bit as well.

Getting to the bottom of things

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I’ve take a LOT of windmill photos since I got into this photography thang a few years ago. I don’t think I’d call it an obsession, but then again I’d be the last to notice. Although they make a really nice addition to scenic North Dakota landscape photos, I’ve started to explore them a little more closely.

This old pump still remains at the base of an otherwise unremarkable remnant of an old windmill. The blades that would turn this old pump are long gone, yet the heart of it remains. I enjoy getting landowner permission to poke around and photograph things like this and imagine what they were like when they were new. I’ve even come across windmills like this which are still operating faithfully, which is an even better find.

My two new favorite windmill photos

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On Saturday evening I went out on a spur-of-the-moment photo jaunt just before sunset, with a particular target of opportunity in mind. I wasn’t the only one; as I bolted down a familiar stretch of gravel road I passed a couple camped out in a blind waiting for some critters to pass by. Just as I reached the windmill above I silently lamented the fact that I’d pretty much missed the sunset. Experience has taught me that sunlight does some pretty cool things just as the sun traverses the horizon, so I kept shooting anyway.

I’m sure glad I did. The photo above, which I’d dismissed at the time due to the waning sun and lack of available preparation time, is actually the first one I snapped and pretty much my favorite. The colors and detail I drew from this shot were a pleasant surprise once I got home and fired up the computer. There’s plenty more, too.

This shot is looking the other way just a few minutes later, while the sun is still giving a pink and purple cast to the sky in its wake. I used an off-camera flash to take advantage of the reflective blades of the windmill while using a slow exposure to soak up the remaining light. The way this shot turned out was another very pleasant surprise.

There have been times where I’ve rolled up to a location and given in to frustration because the conditions weren’t what I wanted or expected. This is a great example of why a person should always continue clicking away on that shutter, because there’s a good chance some unexpected photos like this may result. Kind of like the phrase, “you go to war with the army you’ve got,” you’ve got to shoot in the conditions you’re given. Do what you’ve trained to do, and come home to discover what you may not have seen through the viewfinder at the time.

Prescience…as another one bites the dust

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In February the sale of Farmers Livestock, located east of Bismarck, was announced. Along with the auction facility itself, located just off the Expressway on Yegen Road, was included a large parcel of property across the street which was essentially pasture. That parcel was of particular interest to me because it contained the area’s most proximate windmill…one of my favorite photo subjects.

I surmised in this post back in February that the sale of the land could bring with it the demise of this familiar object. As it turns out, I was correct.

Imagine my surprise and dismay when, on a little photo trip along Apple Creek Road, I found the property was being prepared for development. All that remains of that beloved windmill is the well itself, for however long that may be. It’s marked on my GPS as well as Google Earth, so it’ll be interesting to see what ends up occupying this spot as well as the enormous chunk of land that has been cleared for development.

So, too bad we lost one. Don’t worry about me, though…I’ve got more windmills marked in my GPS and in my head. I’ve got lots more. I’m just glad I had the forethough to bolt out and grab one more series of shots, where it’s bathed in a brilliant orange sunset glow, before vanishing from the local landscape forever.

We’ve got a man down, Dude

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So there I was, working this abandoned farmstead with my camera along with my good friend Ken…when I noticed something right in front of me that had escaped my attention the entire time I’d been there: a windmill. You’d think that, with my penchant for photographing old windmills, it would have been the first thing I’d have found; however, this one was lying face-up in the grass at least a hundred feet from where one would expect to find it.

It would be interesting to find out the story behind this…the absence of twisted metal leads one to believe it was removed and not torn asunder by the prairie wind. It wasn’t talking, but I’m glad it did manage somehow to attract my gaze so I could try a few angles for my “Fallen Farms” series.

Because it’s me…you know it’s gotta have windmills

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I don’t know what my fascination with old windmills is…probably that they’re so photogenic and a good subject, especially when framed against those expansive prairie skies. It stands to reason, then, that I’d be absolutely tickled upon finding one nestled deep within this weekend’s aurora photography setting.

I couldn’t have asked for a better convergence of photo phactors. The light of the full moon, which I feared would work against us, actually performed admirably at lighting the farmstead foreground. Just to make sure things turned out the way I wanted, I also brought my six-D-cell “Louisville Slugger” Mag-Lite flashlight. It ended up coming in handy to dissuade an errant skunk from getting too close as it ambled through the farmyard nearby.

To add to the fun, the auroras really turned it up a notch just as I set up to photograph this old windmill. I took advantage of the whole evening and morning. Trust me…I’ve still got plenty more where this came from. 🙂

Into the wind…the solar wind, that is

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Upon returning to the Bizzo following a family funeral in Dickinson, I settled in and decided to check the arsenal of websites I use to attempt my aurora borealis predictions. Things looked promising, and I made a mental note to head out for a look-see after a while. Before long, however, I got a call from a friend who was already out and about: the Northern Lights were blazing!

When my best friend and I arrived on the scene, the colors were pretty faint and uniform. That gave me time to wander around the field in an attempt to find an angle that provided what I was looking for. The windmill didn’t want to cooperate, as its head was facing the wrong direction at first. A small breeze apparently corrected that later.

Things ramped up for a bit, painting a sharper wall of light across the northern sky. Northern Lights can take on many permutations; dancing spikes of light, cascading sheets, and sometimes winding bands of glowing green that snake across the sky. This happened to be the long band variety. After a while, things appeared to wane, and it was getting cold…so I decided to pack up the gear.

Apparently that’s what the sky was waiting for, because as soon as we began to drive away the intensity flared and we started to get some additional colors and spikes. I hadn’t made it far down the road, so I whipped around and bolted over to the previous position to grab a quick few shots. This time some reds began to make an appearance as well as the light began to dance more brightly.

Finally – some spikes of color began to appear amid the horizon’s green and blue aura! They were elusive and short-lived, but they were there. I spent a few more minutes in the cold but otherwise perfect night, and the sky began to settle. Hiking back to the truck for the night, I got the gear stowed and checked the numbers one more time.

The way things were looking, I figured that there was a chance that things would flare up again around 3am as they’re known to do. It was approaching midnight, however, and I wasn’t about to sit out in the cold and find out. The plan was to head home, check on things before bed, and make the call there. In this case I decided to go to bed instead of back out into the night, predicting that the skies were going to settle. It turned out to be the right call; things dropped off after that.

I have a link on my Northern Lights page (link in the upper right column) for each of the many sites I use to “throw in the hopper” and make the call on whether I figure chasing after Northern Lights is worthwhile. It’s a soft science at best. In this case, one particular model was accurate and another was not. In other cases, a different model will make the correct prediction. It really ends up coming down to gut instinct: trying to determine which numbers to trust. Yesterday’s solar wind blast was expected, but it was not expected to cause any auroras. One blip on one set of data is what made me suspicious, and it turned out to be the right call.

Since I’m a husband and Daddy these days, I can’t be bolting out of town every night in the hopes of getting a lucky encounter with the auroras, so I’m trying to see if I can get a better sense of when such a trip is worthwhile. Last night my instincts proved correct.

Just in case

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Upon hearing the news that Arlon Voge has sold Farmers Livestock and will be closing ‘er up after the 28th of the month, I had a disturbing thought. One news report said an adjacent piece of land was also sold as part of the deal, and I thought, “What if that’s the piece of land containing one of my favorite local windmills?” Gasp! So I figured it would be nice to go out and take some nice photos of it just in case.

The sun cooperated with me as I found the windmill bathed in Golden Hour sunlight upon my arrival. I snapped a few pics in the cold and, as the sun began to descend beyond the horizon, I spun around to do some silhouette shots with the burning skies in the background.

If this windmill indeed becomes a casualty of the sale, I’ll at least have some nice memories of it.

I’m not the only one who likes cameras and windmills

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My little 3 year old was quite excited about getting to hop in the truck with Daddy and to have his own camera, my very first point-n-shoot Olympus that I’ve had for quite some time now. We wandered across the landscape, took a walk together, and then went in pursuit of the sunset. I told him we could find a windmill, and he thought that was an excellent idea…so off we went.

This is one of his photos, a snapshot of a windmill on a minimum maintenance road north of Bismarck. We actually arrived a little late for the sunset…not because the sun had gone down, but because a line of clouds had moved in across the horizon, cutting our time short. Nevertheless we were still able to get some windmill photos in before going home for a story and bedtime.