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G. Donald Bain
Oil Among the Vines
Vineyard Avenue in the Edison Oil Field, East of Bakersfield, California, USA

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The San Joaquin Valley is the largest grape growing area in California, and here we see the beginnings of next year's crop. The grape vines are heavily pruned back each winter, then erupt into exuberant growth early in the spring. The grapes may be sold fresh, dried into raisins, or made into wine.

The southern San Joaquin is also an historically important oil producing area, though most fields are played out now. In this area oil wells are scattered through the orange groves and vineyards. Pumps like this are known as walking beam or sucker rod pumps, and crude oil is slowly drawn to the surface from thousands of feet below. This is where the contemporary energy economy begins.

Geographic Coordinates:
Latitude: 35° 19' 25" N
Longitude: 118° 53' 49" W
Elevation: 139 m
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Time/Date:
March 21, 2008, about 1 pm PDT.

Equipment:
Photographed with an Olympus E-3 digital SLR with an 8mm Zuiko fisheye lens, on a Nodal Ninja VR mount, Acratec Ultimate Ballhead, and Velbon carbon-fiber tripod. Stitched with PTGui Pro 7.2 on a Macintosh Intel Core 2 Duo MacBook, retouched with Photoshop CS3, converted to QTVR using Cubic Converter.

See more panoramas of California (and all of western North America) on my website: Don Bain's Virtual Guidebooks.

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