Earlier I wrote that the wildflower season was coming to an end. To my surprise, it just keeps on going. The September rains were very beneficial and the result is I get to enjoy the flowers for a fews weeks more.
Here are some wildflower photographs from later September through mid October.
The Weatherford Trail in the San Francisco Peaks has been a popular trail for hikers, mountain bikers (outside the wilderness boundary, of course), equestrians, and trail runners. In the fall, the aspens on the sides of the peaks and especially those in Weatherford Canyon are truly photo worthy.
But in 2022 the Pipeline Fire changed everything. The hillsides were burned leaving only a few lucky surviving trees. The canyon suffered not only the fire but massive flooding in the aftermath. The flooding created 10–20 foot deep gullies on the mountain.
I finally visited a portion of the Weatherford Trail in early October as part of the annual War Dog Run + Walk. The hillsides were covered with the skeleton remains of the trees that burned. But new growth is returning. Once there were stands of ponderosa pine but now there are aspen groves. After just three years these aspen trees stand at five to eight feet tall. And the hillsides are covered in them. Where once a trail traveled through an open forest of ponderosa pine, it now has aspen trees crowding the trail.
In the years to come these new aspen forests will bring a mountainside of fall color to the south side of the San Francisco Peaks — just as the massive fires in the late 19th century created the magnificent aspen groves in the Inner Basin region.
Fire is a natural part of the forests here. It is painful when the scar is fresh but, in time, it heals itself.
Wildflowers have been scarce for most of this summer because of a lack of rainfall. The summer rainy season was a bust but September was much wetter. As a result, we had a late–season burst of wildflowers across northern Arizona and Flagstaff. Shorter days and much cooler nights, however, signal the end is near.
Here are a few photographs from this morning (01Oct2025) along the Highland Trail just south of Flagstaff. I was using a recently purchased used-but-new-to me Sony RX10m4 camera. This has a 24mm–600mm (35mm equivalent) zoom and all of these photographs were shot at the maximum 600mm. (Note: I bought this to replace my old Sony RX10 which has an optical issue but cannot be serviced. “Parts not available.”)
And now fall leaf color season begins.
In a normal year we would not hike up this canyon in the summer because of the threat of thunderstorms and flooding. But this year has been anything but normal when it comes to rain and the monsoon season. So during one of the many long stretches of dry weather we returned to West Fork Oak Creek canyon and hiked up about 5 miles (or about 2 miles beyond the “end of trail” sign) upstream.
Because of the lack of rain some of the canyon vegetation was stressed. Ferns were already withering. Leaves were turning brown and even falling from the trees. The outlook for a vibrant and colorful fall leaf season isn’t looking good.
But the hike was fine and the water was clear and visitor traffic was low–especially beyond the end of trail.
Our next hike up the canyon will probably be in mid winter when ice covers the stream allowing passage through the various narrows.
We continue to enjoy seeing wildflowers on our hikes in northern Arizona–although the extended dry period has reduced the numbers. Recently we hiked the Arizona Trail between Aspen Corner and Bismark Lake.
As before, identification of the flowers was done via an iPhone app and reverse image lookup. There may be errors.