PICTURE: A sedge whose blades have desiccated into Christmas ribbons.

This Gallery is in its discovery stage. 

Throughout my adult life I did not much like sparklies, squigglies, starbursts, or other such excessive displays of bling.

But in the desert’s arid winter, desiccating grasses bend and twist on themselves.  They dry into amazing symmetries, complexities, and exquisite designs.

There is not so much to see in the desert in the dead of winter, making these diminutive masterpieces noticeable. 

Over years Squigglies, Sparklies, and Starbursts c started shouting out their lacy intricacies to my camera – or maybe my visual ‘hearing’ just got better.

I think Squigglies are one of the desert’s unique phenomena, existing nowhere else in such intricate high desert Sierra Nevada artistry.