Reflections on a dam

Tributary with Ice 6x6 oil, copyright 2011
SOLD!

Early in February my husband, son and I went tromping through the woods along the creek.  A neighbor had told us that a very ambitious pair of beavers had tried to dam up the creek over the summer.  Because of concerns over the breaking dam potentially causing flash flooding, the beaver were trapped and moved elsewhere.  The remnants of the dam are surprisingly still in place considering that they had built it out of corn stalks of all things!

Just upstream of the dam the water was deep and quiet.  The creek usually doesn't freeze over completely, but there was quite a bit of ice in this spot.  Across the creek from us was one of the many little tributaries that are more typical of the waters that beavers prefer to dam up.  It was a sunny day, and the contrast between the ice and the reflections were what caught my eye on this one.

Unlike the previous 6x6's, I took my time on this one, even going back to it several times to touch up here and there.  It kind of felt this was my first try at applying what I had learned from the previous nine.  I just wish I had time to do more of these!