The Quiet Picture

Althought we are not suffering from such severe heat waves and drought as the rest of Europe, the water levels are low in the lakes. This provided me an opportunity to walk on the shore of the Loossjön lake, as during normal water levels you either get bog or forest right to the edge of the water, making it impossible to follow the shoreline. The lake is at least partly artificial though, I’m not entirely sure but I reckon that there used to be a small lake that was then made larger when a dam was built. The dead and sunken trees that are lining the shore are proof of this, especially all the pine roots which at some places build up large lattices and make me wish that I could take one of them home.It started to look like these roots would be the most interesting thing on the shore, when I suddenly came across some flowers growing right in the water (not waterlilies!). I was fascinated - I had never seen this flower before! Happily I settled down to photograph them and tried to ignore the multitude of horse flies that fill up the gaps that mosquitos leave when it’s sunny (although sometimes you get pestered by both). When I got home, I checked my flower book and ID’d the flower as Lobelia dortmanna (water lobelia (EN), notblomster (SW), nuottaruoho (FI)). Apparently, a fairly common flower, so I must have just been missing it until now.

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I discovered another new flower on the shore as well, but close to the parking. I tidied it up and was about to get my camera from the car, when another car appeared. I just stared at the people in disbelief - they went swimming right in front of the the flowers I was going to shoot! I was so mad I could’ve screamed, this really is not the first time a similar thing has happened. I took a deep breath, counted to ten, and did my shoreline walk instead. The light was long gone by the time I got back, not that it really mattered - a new car load of people had arrived instead, swimming in front of the flowers. Oh well.

Nymphaea alba candida

• English: White Waterlily
• Swedish: Nordnäckros
• Finnish: Pohjanlumme

If I really had to name my #1 favourite flower, it would probably be the white waterlily. It goes way back to my childhood - all those endless summers at my parents’ summer house. We have a shallow, mud bottom bay nearby and I remember we used to have a few white waterlilies there. Then every year they got fewer and fewer until finally none were left, only the yellow ones remained. That was… well, must be over 20 years ago. The fact is that not many white waterlilies appear on any of the lakes I normally visit when I’m in Finland. When we’ve found then, it has always been special.Then I moved to Sweden, and found white waterlilies growing in the small lake in the middle of Ljusdal. And I found them everywhere else, as well, I just couldn’t believe it! But this abundance doesn’t mean that they are easy to photograph. The problem is mostly that they grow in water - your options are either to use a big telephoto lens from the shore, wade in (if it’s not too deep and muddy) or take a boat (precarious at best). I have tried options #1 and #2, even if one of my best waterlily images was taken with a 100mm lens looking straight down, thanks to receding water levels in a lake. Then last summer I finally found white waterlily nirvana. A small forest lake tucked away just across the Voxnan river, with waterlilies growing right at the shore in perfect reach for my 300mm lens. So now when the waterlily season is at its best, I know exactly where to go!

Last summer when I was shooting waterlilies in a nearby lake semi-popular with the bathing crowd (that was just before I discovered my waterlily pond), a woman came by and we started chatting, with her being an occasional photographer as well. When I commented on the beauty of the white waterlies, she was not impressed. They are causing the lake to get overgrown, she said. But I could never blame the white waterlilies for that. If they turn lakes into marshland, fine by me - that’s how nature works. I will just admire it!

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Image specs: ISO 200, f6.3, 1/250, Canon 300mm f4L w/21mm ext. tube, Moose polarizer