Randy Olson, Melissa Farlow Photography

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  • La Portada on Chile's desert coast has an eroded, natural arch created by marine erosion by ocean waters like much of the surrounding coastal cliffs. The La Portada Natural Monument is south of Antofagasta.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187601.jpg
  • Aerial view shows snow that accentuates the contours of a flattened, freshly cut mountaintop removal site in Cabin Creek, West Virginia. Mountaintop removal is a mining practice where the tops of mountains are blasted away to expose the seams of coal underneath.<br />
As much as 500 feet or more of a mountain summit may be leveled. The earth and rock from the mountaintop is then dumped into the neighboring valleys.<br />
Analysis from a study that Appalachian Voices commissioned along with Natural Resources Defense Council  shows that 1.2 million acres have been mined for coal. “Over 500 mountains have been leveled, and nearly 2,000 miles of precious Appalachian headwater streams have been buried and polluted by mountaintop removal.”
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM6773_1023729-2.JPG
  • Aerial view shows snow that accentuates the contours of a flattened, freshly cut mountaintop removal site in Cabin Creek, West Virginia. Mountaintop removal is a mining practice where the tops of mountains are blasted away to expose the seams of coal underneath.<br />
As much as 500 feet or more of a mountain summit may be leveled. The earth and rock from the mountaintop is then dumped into the neighboring valleys.<br />
Analysis from a study that Appalachian Voices commissioned along with Natural Resources Defense Council  shows that 1.2 million acres have been mined for coal. “Over 500 mountains have been leveled, and nearly 2,000 miles of precious Appalachian headwater streams have been buried and polluted by mountaintop removal.”
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM6773_1023729-1.JPG
  • Aerial view shows snow that accentuates the contours of a flattened, freshly cut mountaintop removal site in Cabin Creek, West Virginia. Mountaintop removal is a mining practice where the tops of mountains are blasted away to expose the seams of coal underneath.<br />
As much as 500 feet or more of a mountain summit may be leveled. The earth and rock from the mountaintop is then dumped into the neighboring valleys.<br />
Analysis from a study that Appalachian Voices commissioned along with Natural Resources Defense Council  shows that 1.2 million acres have been mined for coal. “Over 500 mountains have been leveled, and nearly 2,000 miles of precious Appalachian headwater streams have been buried and polluted by mountaintop removal.”
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM6773_1023729.jpg
  • Lightning cracks in a cloud-filled sky with rain falling in distance.
    RANDY OLSON_04319_972061.TIF
  • The abandoned Beaux Art neoclassical style Michigan Central Station.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MT6613_1457234.jpg
  • The Trans-Alaska Pipeline runs through the Alaskan wilderness connecting the oil fields of Prudhoe Bay in northern Alaska, U.S., with the harbor at Valdez, 800 miles to the south. Half of the pipeline is elevated to prevent the heated oil in it from thawing the permafrost and to allow wildlife to pass more easily under it. The pipeline is also cooled by refrigerant coils that keep them from transmitting heat into the thaw-sensitive permafrost. The pipeline pumps 47,000 gallons of oil a month.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM6659_705772.jpg
  • Trees alongside Jamaica Pond, designed by Frederick Law Olmstead, are silhouetted by the setting sun. A glacial kettle hole, Olmsted preserved much of the existing vegetation and framed the pond in trees and shrubs in the Emerald Necklace. It is a part of a 1,100-acre chain of parks linked by parkways and waterways in Boston and Brookline, Massachusetts.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM6560_968602.jpg
  • Wind and water sculpted desert in the Valle de la Luna. Shadows fall in the Valley of the Moon in the Atacama Desert, the driest place on earth where the elements have left an array of oddly shaped polychrome forms in the desolate, eroded desert landscape. The region sometimes goes without recorded precipitation for more than a century.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187507.jpg
  • Vine maple leaves display bright autumn colors.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM7061_760115.jpg
  • A field of sunflowers is in full bloom in summer months.Nebraska ranks 6th in the U.S. in sunflower production.
    RANDY OLSON_MM8429_2481056.JPG
  • Vine maple leaves display bright autumn colors.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM7061_760116.jpg
  • A lone tourist walks among the El Tatio geysers in the Atacama desert north of San Pedro at 4300 meters above sea level in the Andes Mountains. The world's highest geyser field has over 80 active geysers with a steaming field of boiling water that spews and sprays at sunrise leaving white mineral deposits.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187594.jpg
  • Silhouetted men fish in the Firehole River surrounded by geothermal activity.
    RANDY OLSON_06103_495712.JPG
  • Sunlight highlights aspen trees, Populus tremuloides, as their colors turn golden in the autumn. "Quaking aspen" is Colorado's signature tree in the high altitude of the San Juan mountains near Silverton. Aspens grow in large clonal colonies, derived from a single seedling. They spread by root suckers and new starts may pop up 100–130 ft from the parent tree. Each tree may live for 40–150 years, but the root system of the colony can be thousands of years old sending up new trunks as the older trees die off above ground.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM6659_705744.jpg
  • Blue ghostly, silhouetted mountains disappear into the distance of the vast and desolate million-acre wilderness of Grand Canyon-Parashant National Monument in Arizona.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM6659_705735.jpg
  • Sunlight illuminates Half Dome in the Sierra Nevada Mountains at sunset.
    RANDY OLSON_06103_495581.JPG
  • Sunlight filters through the autumn leaves of aspen trees. Populus tremuloides, aspens, have heart-shaped leaves that tremble in the slightest breeze which is why they are also called "quaking aspens." Backlit in warm sun, the tree native to North America, thrives in the higher altitude of the San Juan Mountains in Colorado.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM6659_705748.jpg
  • Tourists are drawn to El Tatio, a geothermal field with geysers north of San Pedro at 4300 meters above sea level located in the Andes Mountains in the Atacama Desert.  More than 70 geysers and fumaroles spew hot water and steam as the sun rises in Chile near the Bolivian border.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187554-1.JPG
  • A lone cyclist crosses the maritime chaparral of Fort Ord National Monument, once a bustling Army post on central California's Monterey Peninsula and now a Bureau of Land Management-run reserve for recreation and scarce native habitats. The coastal gem has 86 miles of trails to ride a bike or horse or hike through diverse habitats.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM6659_705729-51.JPG
  • The arid plateau north of the Grand Canyon is viewed from Navajo sandstone rocks of Coyote Buttes. From a 3,000-foot-high escarpment to a canyon 2,500 feet deep, Arizona's Vermillion Cliffs National Monument encloses a host of geological wonders.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM6659_705729-41.JPG
  • Crossbeds of Navajo sandstone paint the Coyote Buttes in hues created by the precipitation of oxides. From a 3,000-foot-high escarpment to a canyon 2,500 feet deep, Arizona's Vermillion Cliffs National Monument encloses a host of geological wonders.<br />
<br />
The 280,000 acre wildness area is federally protected and a permit is required to reduce impact on the geological treasure.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM6659_705729-40.JPG
  • Views along the Dalton highway reveal the Trans-Alaska Pipeline System (TAPS). The oil transportation system spanning 800 miles across Alaska lies partly in the foothills of the Brooks Range. It includes the trans-Alaska crude-oil pipeline, 11 pump stations, several hundred miles of feeder pipelines, running through Alaska's wilderness to the Valdez Marine Terminal. TAPS is elevated and cooled by refrigeration coils to keep the warmed oil from melting the permafrost. Completed in 1977, it is one of the world's largest pipeline systems.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM6659_705729-28.JPG
  • A spectacular formation of vibrant colors in swirls of fragile sandstone is known as The Wave and is located in the Coyote Buttes section of Vermilion Cliffs National Monument. An unmarked wilderness trail limits hikers and requiries a permit from the Bureau of Land Management.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM6659_705699-5.JPG
  • A spectacular formation of vibrant colors in swirls of fragile sandstone is known as The Wave and is located in the Coyote Buttes section of Vermilion Cliffs National Monument. An unmarked wilderness trail limits hikers and requiries a permit from the Bureau of Land Management.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM6659_705699-4.JPG
  • A spectacular formation of vibrant colors in swirls of fragile sandstone is known as The Wave and is located in the Coyote Buttes section of Vermilion Cliffs National Monument. An unmarked wilderness trail limits hikers and requiries a permit from the Bureau of Land Management.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM6659_705699-3.JPG
  • A spectacular formation of vibrant colors in swirls of fragile sandstone is known as The Wave and is located in the Coyote Buttes section of Vermilion Cliffs National Monument. An unmarked wilderness trail limits hikers and requiries a permit from the Bureau of Land Management.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM6659_705699-1.JPG
  • A spectacular formation of vibrant colors in swirls of fragile sandstone is known as The Wave and is located in the Coyote Buttes section of Vermilion Cliffs National Monument. An unmarked wilderness trail limits hikers and requiries a permit from the Bureau of Land Management.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM6659_705699-2.JPG
  • Snow blows across an icy, wintery back road in Steens Mountain as harsh weather comes to Oregon's high desert.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM7517_1222778.jpg
  • A blanket is rolled onto the Pitztal Glacier to prevent snow from melting. It is a method workers use to combat the effects of climate change and global warming.  Integral to the local economy, ski resorts need protection from higher temperatures that melt the ice.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM7139_1024108.TIF
  • Walkers on a fog-shrouded beach at low tide.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM7061_760071.jpg
  • Hydroseed grass is sprayed on steep contours of a reclaimed mountaintop removal mine site in an effort to control erosion. Reclamation requires mining companies to return the land to it's original contours and plant but little grows on these rocky soils and the operation is often repeated.  Spray-on grass replaces more than 60 tree species that ruled some of the world’s most diverse temperate forests.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM6773_1023732.jpg
  • Snow accents the contours of a fresh valley fill at a coal mine site. Tops of mountains are blasted away and flattened to reveal a small seam of coal, and the rock and debris is dumped into V-shaped valleys filling in stream beds.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM6773_1023727.jpg
  • The Wave, a fragile sandstone formation in Coyote Buttes section of Vermilion Cliffs National Monument. The 280,000 acre wildness area is federally protected and a permit is required to reduce impact on the geological treasure.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM6659_705704.jpg
  • A spectacular formation of vibrant colors in swirls of fragile sandstone is known as The Wave located in the Coyote Buttes section of the Vermilion Cliffs National Monument. An unmarked wilderness trail is limited to hikers with permits from the Bureau of Land Management.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM6659_705698.jpg
  • Views along the Dalton highway reveal the Trans-Alaska Pipeline System (TAPS), an oil transportation system spanning Alaska that includes the trans-Alaska crude-oil pipeline, 11 pump stations, several hundred miles of feeder pipelines, running through Alaska's wilderness to the Valdez Marine Terminal. TAPS is elevated and cooled by refrigeration coils to keep the warmed oil from melting the permafrost. It is one of the world's largest pipeline systems.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM6659_705684.jpg
  • Hiking along an overlook above a rocky shoreline on the Lost Coast in the King Range National Conservation Area (NCA).<br />
The King Range NCA encompasses 68,000 acres along 35 miles of California’s north coast. The landscape was too rugged for highway building, giving the remote region the title of California’s Lost Coast. It is the Nation's first NCA, designated in 1970.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM6659_705678.jpg
  • Sunlight highlights grasses and sand dunes on the shore of Lake Michigan at Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore.
    MELISSA FARLOW_06103_495811.jpg
  • Dune grasses glow with warm setting sun on the shore of Lake Michigan user a stormy sky at Sleeping Bear National Lakeshore.
    MELISSA FARLOW_06103_495510.jpg
  • A single white car travels north on the Pan American Highway as it follows the oceans and coastline through desert sands along Peru's Pacific coast.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187605.jpg
  • Tourists explore the salt flats near San Pedro, in the Atacama Desert. Salar de Atacama is surrounded by mountains, and has no drainage outlets. Water evaporates leaving small deposits of crusted salt.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187558.jpg
  • Desolate beauty of the Valley of the Moon, from constant erosion. The weathered landscape is known as the driest place on earth and a century can pass without measurable precipitation. Shadows fall in the Atacama Desert where wind has left an array of oddly shaped polychrome forms in the desolate, eroded, desert landscape.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187554.jpg
  • Hikers walking along the top ridge of a large dune in the Atacama Desert a region in north Chile that is considered the driest place on earth. Located between the Andes and Coastal mountains, the parched desert is formed by wind and erosion.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187547.jpg
  • A lone hiker climb atop weathered desert sand landscape of driest place on earth. The Atacama Desert sometimes goes more than a century without recorded precipitation. The Atacama Desert is also considered the oldest desert on earth. On the whole, it has experienced semi-arid conditions for over 150 million years, and the inner core—the driest spot—has been hyper-arid for over 15 million years.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187540.jpg
  • Hikers follow a trail in the last light at dusk and climb to the top of weathered desert landscape for a view of the driest place on earth. The Atacama Desert sometimes goes more than a century with no recorded measurable precipitation. The Atacama Desert is considered the oldest desert on earth. On the whole, it has experienced semi-arid conditions for over 150 million years, and the inner core—the driest spot—has been hyper-arid for over 15 million years.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187536.jpg
  • Weathered landscape of the driest place on earth where a century can pass without recorded precipitation. Shadows fall in the Valley of the Moon in the Atacama Desert where wind has left an array of oddly shaped polychrome forms in the desolate, eroded, desert landscape.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187533.jpg
  • Wind blows makeshift shelters of El Nino victims of flash flooding in the desert of Peru.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187041.jpg
  • A village lays at the foot of a mountain range.
    RANDY OLSON_MM6879_708738.TIF
  • A silhouetted child runs on a rock studded beach at sunset.
    RANDY OLSON_06019_489014.JPG
  • Shadows and sun sets on the arid plateau and rock face creating stunning colors of the Vermillion Cliffs.  From a 3,000-foot-high escarpment to a canyon 2,500 feet deep, Arizona's Vermillion Cliffs National Monument encloses a host of geological wonders.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM6659_705729-35.JPG
  • A blanket is rolled onto the Pitztal Glacier to keep ice from melting and  protect the ski industry in the Alps.<br />
Glacial melts first recorded at the start of the 19th century—a point that also coincides with the start of the industrial age and burning of large amounts of fossil fuels. Since then the glaciers have lost between 30 to 40% of their area and nearly half their volume.  The coverings remind us of little mountains they are creating out of felt.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM7139_1024109.jpg
  • A spectacular formation of vibrant colors in swirls of fragile sandstone is known as The Wave and is located in the Coyote Buttes section of Vermilion Cliffs National Monument. An unmarked wilderness trail limits hikers and requiries a permit from the Bureau of Land Management.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM6659_705699.jpg
  • The Pan American Highway is an empty, lonely, desolate road as it runs along Peru's Pacific desert coast along the ocean for hundreds of miles.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187603.jpg
  • Hikers walking along the top ridge of a large sand dune in the Atacama Desert. Known as the driest place on earth, the desert is also considered the oldest. It has experienced semi-arid conditions for over 150 million years, and the inner core—the driest spot—has been hyper-arid for over 15 million years.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187548.jpg
  • A boat cuts through reflections of clouds in the placid waters of the St. Mary’s River in Southern Georgia. The St. Mary’s forms a division between Florida and Georgia as it flows east to the Atlantic Ocean out of the Okefenokee Swamp.
    MELISSA FARLOW_05842_110252.JPG
  • Some prized horses live a pampered life in retirement and command large amount of money for breeding rights in the hopes they’ll pass on the best qualities of their bloodline. An Irish farm, Ashford Stud which is part of international horse racing business Coolmore, was built in recent years and features stone barns and bridges creating the charm of an earlier era. Stalls are filled with plush straw for bedding under chandeliers that shine in the cupolas.  <br />
Past Kentucky Derby winner Thunder Gulch's stud fees are as high as $125,000 per mating. A farm worker leads the stallion to a breeding barn.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM7017_720965.TIF
  • Ferns in Tongass National Forest.
    MELISSA FARLOW_RF4115_1114698.jpg
  • Snowfall on evergreen trees.
    MELISSA FARLOW_RF4115_1114691.jpg
  • Black bear feeding on salmon in the Tongass National Forest.
    MELISSA FARLOW_RF4115_1114631.jpg
  • Black bear in the Tongass National Forest.
    MELISSA FARLOW_RF4115_1114627.jpg
  • Bossons Glacier near Mont Blanc Tunnel.
    MELISSA FARLOW_RF4115_1114570.jpg
  • Maple leaves in autumn colors.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM7061_760059.jpg
  • Hobet 21 mountain top removal coal mine grows larger and approaches a family home. Mines run 24 hours a day, seven days a week creating coal dust impossible to keep out of houses.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM6773_1023747.jpg
  • A ginseng plant and it's roots in a woman's hand as a family hunts for ginseng in a West Virginia forest. A native plant in the Appalachian forest, ginseng is highly prized and harvested as a cash crop. It has been used for centuries in North America and Asia for a variety of illnesses and to increase vitality.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM6773_1023708.jpg
  • Bulldozers push rocks into hills attempting to reclaim the land after coal mining at a mountaintop removal mining site. This small mine site dwarfs the equipment so they look like toys.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM6773_1023667.jpg
  • Mysterious Nazca lines form animal and geometric figures seen from the air.  A hummingbird shape as well as perfect geometric designs like triangles, rectangles and straight lines run for several kilometers across the desert. The desert floor is covered in a layer of iron oxide-coated pebbles of a deep rust color. Anthropologists believe the Nazca culture that created them began around 100 B.C. and flourished from A.D. 1 to 700. The ancient peoples created their designs by removing the top 12 to 15 inches of rock, revealing the lighter-colored sand below.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187620.jpg
  • An anhinga in Kakadu National Park.
    RANDY OLSON_RF4319_1114460.JPG
  • A lioness in the savannah.
    RANDY OLSON_RF4319_1114438.JPG
  • A Maasai tribesman herding goats.
    RANDY OLSON_RF4319_1114433.JPG
  • A Maasai tribesman walking in the savannah.
    RANDY OLSON_RF4319_1114431.JPG
  • A Masai child waves to tourists.
    RANDY OLSON_RF4319_1114429.JPG
  • An elephant and wildebeests walking through the savannah.
    RANDY OLSON_RF4319_1114426.JPG
  • An elephant walking through the savannah.
    RANDY OLSON_RF4319_1114425.JPG
  • A pair of male lions.
    RANDY OLSON_RF4319_1114422.JPG
  • Tourists photograph lions from a jeep while on safari.
    RANDY OLSON_RF4319_1114419.JPG
  • Lion cubs playing.
    RANDY OLSON_RF4319_1114416.JPG
  • Wildebeests grazing in the savannah.
    RANDY OLSON_RF4319_1114412.JPG
  • A cheetah lying down beneath tree on savannah.
    RANDY OLSON_RF4319_1114406.JPG
  • A male lion, sitting on savannah scratching mane.
    RANDY OLSON_RF4319_1114403.JPG
  • A boat aground on a mudflat.
    RANDY OLSON_RF4319_1114381.JPG
  • Twilight over a mudflat.
    RANDY OLSON_RF4319_1114380.JPG
  • A range of mountains and a grove of trees in Australia.
    RANDY OLSON_RF4319_1114340.JPG
  • A pelican in Australian waters.
    RANDY OLSON_RF4319_1114335.JPG
  • Students attend a school in Ileret, Kenya.
    RANDY OLSON_MM8259_2328132.JPG
  • Aerial of Kenya's Omo Delta near Ileret.
    RANDY OLSON_MM8259_2328110.JPG
  • Algae grow in pools at the southern edge of Lake Turkana.
    RANDY OLSON_MM8259_2281797.TIF
  • The Vyvenka River loops through a floodplain in an oxbow curve in Kamchatka, a peninsula in far east Russia that is the size of California but only 130 kilometers of roads.  All roads are clustered around the capital, Petropavlovsk.  All other travel is by plane, MI-8 helicopter or something they call an ATV but we refer to them as a tank. Flying over the big empty landscape, the view is wetlands, tundra, braided streams, and meandering unconstrained rivers. Free of roads and dams, it is the perfect environment for salmon swimming upstream to spawn.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7593_1248217.TIF
  • A controlled fire helps prevent flooding early in  the wet season.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7112_968666.JPG
  • Water lilies in bloom.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7112_763268.JPG
  • A barren tree floats adrift in the crystal-clear waters of Palmyra Atoll.
    RANDY OLSON_MM6778_672502.JPG
  • Family bundles in Alpaca wool blankets in the Andean highlands of Ecuador.
    RANDY OLSON_04319_2512731.JPG
  • A palm tree grove at Ahu Nau Nau surrounds a beach on a lush part of Easter Island.
    RANDY OLSON_MM8059_1494004.JPG
  • Pin Oak Farm owner and breeder Josephine Abercrombie ran a prominent 4,000 acre  farm near Versailles. A horse lover in her childhood, she brought sugar cubes to her thoroughbreds hoping for a kiss on the cheek from a gentle mare and foal. Abercrombie died in 2022.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM7017_720968-2-1.JPG
  • Mares and foals gallop across the pasture on an Irish farm, Ashford Stud which is part of international horse racing business Coolmore.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM7017_720965-2.JPG
  • Evening sunset light illuminates a fence on an Kentucky horse farm in early spring.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM7017_720965-1.JPG
  • Cascada Cola de Caballo, Horsetail Fall, has a 75-foot drop as the waterfall flows through Mexico's largest preserve, Cumbres de Monterrey in Las Cumbres National Park south of Monterrey.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187052-3.JPG
  • Taku Glacier advances in the Juneau Ice Field.
    MELISSA FARLOW_RF4115_1114731.jpg
  • Admiralty Island in the Tongass National Forest.
    MELISSA FARLOW_RF4115_1114730.jpg
  • Clear cut on Prince of Wales Island in the Tongass National Forest.
    MELISSA FARLOW_RF4115_1114729.jpg
  • Islands near Winter Harbor in the Tongass National Forest.
    MELISSA FARLOW_RF4115_1114719.jpg
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