Dune scene
An image from my recent visit to the Massachusetts north shore:
The classic dune scene is all sand. The dunes here are covered with a ground cover called wooly hudsonia. It’s all over the place, not just in this one spot – you can walk for miles and see it growing in spotty patches and extensive growths, as you can see here just beyond the foreground grasses and sand. I’m going to go back in the spring to see the yellow flowers – there should be masses of them. The grass is American beach grass.
Nature Diary 
What time of day was this?
It was around 2:30 or 3:00. Nice low angle afternoon winter sunlight. The sunset started at 4:15 or so, late December.
With little competition from other plants it isn’t surprising that the Wooly Hudsonia is so successful in its environment. Late day, which 2:30 is at this time of year, or early morning gives those nice soft shadows. Looking forward the the flowers.
I am as well. It’s such an unusual place.
So amazing and fragile with the sun and wind.
Here, we have something which looks like, it is marram grass, but there is no flower !
It is an unusual and fragile environment. It’s amazing there can be so much vegetation growing in what looks like pure sand. The grasses had a flower, but they have gone to seed.
Whether it’s the light, or the color, or a combination of the two, this gives a sense of ‘winter’ as surely as grasses peeking up through snowdrifts. Have you ever seen this area with snow? As unlikely as that seems, it was unlikely that people would be building snowmen on Galveston beaches a few years back, but it happened.
It does have a wintery look. With a light blanket of snow, you’d just see the grasses and the surrounding trees. But I’ve never been there after a snow.
My first thought was snow, instead of sand, it’s a nice, tranquil scene either way. I’ve only been to the East Coast shore a few times, I’d like to see this in bloom.
Snow is expected here at this time of year, but we almost haven’t had any this winter. The whitish sand has a snowy look, and responds to the wind with the same lines and patterns. Looking forward to seeing the hudsonia bloom.