Images

Aspens in Idaho showing their yellow foliage of autumn.

Vegetation bordering a Yellowstone canyon at Undine Falls.

Vegetation bordering a Yellowstone canyon at Undine Falls.

The Western skink (Plestiodon skiltonianus) is a relatively common and widespread lizard in Southern California. It is more secretive and prefers more grassy habitat than the Western fence lizard or the side-blotched lizard, yet USGS and National Park Service biologists are finding signs of genetic isolation in all these species.

Meandering of the Gibbon River at Yellowstone National Park.

A hiking trail in the back country of Yellowstone National Park.

Little Missouri River near Camp Area C at Albert Pike Recreation Area, Arkansas (photograph by Daniel M. Wagner, U.S. Geological Survey).

Water run off from the Excelsior geyser hot spring. Various extremophilic microbial mats (Domains Archaea and Eubacteria) living in the hot springs, acidic habitats, and geyser basins. Notice the bands of color as microbial populations separate according to their tolerance for differing temperature and/or pH gradients.

Cayey, Puerto Rico geomagnetic observatory.

Absolutes, variations and proton buildings at Cayey magnetic observatory, Puerto Rico.

Autumn foliage on the Snake River.

Coniferous trees along the Snake River.

A portion of the Snake River as it winds its way through Yellowstone National Park.

Roadsides, ranchlands, and mountains.

Byways and Mountains in Autumn.

Roadsides, ranchlands, and mountains.

Remnants of a spruce forest complex following a severe wildfire in the Yukon Flats National Wildlife Refuge, Alaska. Wildfires are the dominant landscape-scale disturbance operating at annual time scales in Alaska, and fires play a major role in the rate and extent of vegetation growth and productivity of a site.

Aneides aeneus (Green salamander) Howards Waterfall Cave, Southeastern Cave Conservancy Preserve, Dade County, Georgia 1.

Looking west at the Cannonball River at Breien, ND.

The Cannonball River looking East.

Walruses gathered on Alaskan shores of the Chukchi Sea by the tens of thousands in late August and September of 2010 after the last of the sea ice dissipated.