Sun Dog

A sun dog is an atmospheric phenomenon that creates patches of light about 22° to the side of the sun.  Usually we see them on cold clear mornings here in the Bear Lake Valley, but this one showed up in the middle of a misty afternoon.

Suns dogs, or parhelia, are created by sunlight refracting through icy clouds of hexagonal crystals.  I was out looking for photo opportunities with Bruce Grayum when we saw this one from a back road near Georgetown, Idaho.  The cows didn’t seem impressed by the huge apparition in the sky near their pasture, but they did provide scale to show the size the sun dog.

It was a cold day, 9° F as we continued to explore.  We stopped at the bridge over the Bear River on the Nounan road and saw the sun dog again, but this time no clear sky was visible at all.  I liked the reflected light in the river.
Sometimes the arcs of light form a complete halo around the sun, and some have faint rainbows of color like this one.  Photographing them can be tricky because the camera must be pointed directly at the sun.  A clean lens is needed to prevent flares, and there is danger of getting a burned retina.  If your camera has it, live view might be a good option.

Our last stop was along Creamery Lane between Georgetown and Nounan where the sun dog appeared in icy mist over a winter landscape of drifts and sagebrush.  Shooting into the sun causes the lens to stop down, darkening the photo, but if the exposure is lengthened, the sun dog seems to blend with the sky and disappear.  I think the darkened exposure presents an other-worldly appearance anyway.

Why are they called “sun dogs”?  No one knows for sure, but the term has been around since the 1600’s and the origin seems to be lost in time.  Some say it is because the "dogs" follow the sun around.

I hope you like this post, but please do not use my copyrighted photos without permission.