2026 Colorado Fall Colors v2

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          Three additional photos taken in October 2026 in the Gunnison/Crested Butte/Norwood areas of Colorado. The first photo features Chimney Rock (the prominent vertical tower on the left) and Courthouse Mountain, located in the Cimarron Mountains sub-range of the San Juan Mountains in southwestern Colorado.

     The photo was taken from Owl Creek Pass Road Ouray (County Road 10 / Forest Service Road 858), situated roughly 10.5 miles east of the town of Ridgway. This area is inside the Uncompahgre Wilderness and served as the cinematic backdrop for the 1969 Western film True Grit starring John Wayne.

The second image is a panorama of Cimarron Ridge near Owl Creek Pass, Ridgway CO.

The third entry is a photo of a cluster of aspen trees near Crested Butte in the Gunnison National Forest area.

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David Sparks

I retired in 2005 after 40 years of research and teaching at the University of Alabama in Birmingham (24 years), the University of Pennsylvania (8 years) and the Baylor College of Medicine (8 years). Photography is my retirement hobby.

Nature photography, especially bird photography, combines a number of things that I really enjoy: bird-watching, being outdoors, photography, travel, messing about with computers, and learning new skills and concepts.  I now spend much of my time engaged in these activities.

David Sibley in the preface to The Sibley Guide to Birds wrote "Birds are beautiful, in spectacular as well as subtle ways; their colors, shapes, actions, and sounds are among the most aesthetically pleasing in nature."  My goal is to acquire images that capture the beauty and uniqueness of selected species as well as images that highlight the engaging behaviors the birds exhibit.