The transition of an Ohio Wetland
I thought I’d share a few images from the Spring Valley Wildlife Area wetland. The images below captures the park’s restoration of an earth dam that stands between the lake and the Little Miami River. The project took place between 2018 and 2023.
My first visit occurred on a foggy morning in September 2018. The fog was thick and somehow eerily fitting for the unsightly disarray I walked upon. There was a trail that led visitors along the lake shore. Apparently, park managers had cut every tree along the pathway and felled them into the lake. From a photographer and first-time visitor perspective, it was a hot mess.
As the fog filtered the sunrise, the moody scene filled with hues of gray and green. As the sun rose higher, the silhouettes of the felled trees grew stronger. On this morning, the fog rapidly burned off, and within minutes the whole mood changed.
What I hadn’t noticed in the dim twilight was how Mother Nature had adorned the fallen trees in thousands of webs. From my position on the lake shore, the sun back lit the webs, creating a striking contrast between the dark silhouettes of branches and the bright webs still holding moisture from the fog moments earlier.
During a 2019 walk-through, the submerged trees still stretched above their watery home, but I found fewer pleasing compositions. Between 2019 and 2022, the lake offered too many distractions for compelling sunrise images, so I pursued other parks.
In understanding the transition, note the image above and then compare it to the one below from 2022. Over the seasons, many of the smaller twigs and branches had fallen away, leaving behind simplified silhouettes. This natural progression and weathering led to more refined compositions that took on fascinating shapes in the morning twilight.
This image in 2022, garnered a few accolades. It was a stunning twilight where the rising sun under lit the morning clouds in wild colors. When I submitted the image to the 2024 Ohio Artist Registry, it became one of 33 prints accepted from 717 submissions. A month later, it went on exhibit at the Carnegie Gallery at the Columbus Metropolitan Library. It also received an honorable mention at the Middletown Art Center Annual Photography Exhibit. Below, I offer a before-and-after view of the scene from 2019 to 2022.
In 2024, park managers began formal remediation of the earth dam. As part of the project, construction teams needed to lower the lake level to fully access and reinforce the structure. The lower lake levels exposed the tree remnants to more weathering, which accelerated their decay. This created many new opportunities for striking silhouettes, as captured on another spring morning.
This final panorama from 2024 employs 133 separate images, blended together to capture a memorable sunrise. The image also shows the restored earth dam and the reopened trail, once again allowing visitors to walk along the lakeshore. I still remember the shock of experiencing the park for the first time in disarray, so seeing the quiet beauty it exudes today feels especially rewarding.
I now have a host of prints that I call “reflectionscapes,” which capture some of the more memorable compositions I discovered in 2022 and 2023. If you’d like to see more scenes from Spring Valley Wildlife Area over the years, check out my Spring Valley Wildlife Area Art Prints.
