Night Light of the North Coast: Two of Humboldt County’s Best Known Features–Our Gorgeous Night Skies and Our Cannabis

David Wilson, a local photographer, provides us with a sometimes column about the beauties of North Coast Skies.

A Humboldt night’s fall sky line of cannabis buds and Douglas-fir trees stands beneath the Milky Way. October, 2015. [All photos by David Wilson]

So I did. I present to you here what I found when I mixed outings into California North Coast’s dark skies with some of Humboldt’s finest. It is too early in the season for outdoor cannabis growing as I write this, so these images from earlier times are previews of the season’s coming attractions.

A young cannabis plant reaches for the stars within a wire framework that will help support its branches as it grows. The ten-minute exposure allowed the stars to move within the frame as the world turned, exposing the Milky Way along the treetops. Humboldt County, California. June 28, 2021.

While the typical outdoor growing season lasts from spring through fall, the North Coast’s skies offer outstanding year-round stargazing, weather permitting, and if you drive a little way out of town. They are not far from anywhere.

A bud growing at Sol Spirit Retreats, which offers cannabis tours and a glamping experience outside of Willow Creek, California. July 25, 2020.

The content of the skies changes with the seasons, gradually shifting the constellations and planets across the sky through the months. The moon cycles through its phases throughout the season. For some, the highlight of the night is the Milky Way, that path of lightness that stretches across our night sky soon after dark in the summer and fall seasons. If you are an early bird, you’ll find it instead in the predawn hours in the first few months of the year, reaching from the southeast to the north.

The Milky Way and skyline reflect in a great water catchment pond at Schackow Farm. The distant hills were illuminated by a crescent moon in the western sky (to the right of the frame). Humboldt County, California. June, 2021.

That “milky way” in the sky inspired the name of our galaxy, the Milky Way. We see it as lighter than the rest of the night sky because when we look toward it, we are looking through our pinwheel-shaped galaxy edge-on, right through the densest number of stars, glowing nebulae, etc. In our edge-on view, all of it blends together into indistinct milkiness in the vast interstellar distances involved. The Galactic Core is the center of the galaxy, and this densest region, the part with the greatest visible detail from Earth, can be seen at the southern end of the Milky Way. I admit to being fascinated by the it. It is a true wonder in the universe.

Young outdoor cannabis plants getting their start in the starlight at Schackow Farm beneath the magnificent skies of southern Humboldt County, California. June, 2021.

The North Coast’s dark skies are dazzling, and in combination with its finest outdoor cannabis, any evening can be a terrific nighttime photographic outing. With camping, glamping and cannabis tours in the area, opportunities abound for enjoying either, or, should you be so inclined, the two together.

Ringed by trees, a giant catchment pond reflects the magnificent sky at Schackow Farm, Humboldt County, California. A crescent moon sinking in the west illuminated the far hills across the Eel River Valley. June, 2021.

To read previous entries of “Night Light of the North Coast,” click on David’s name above the article. To keep abreast of his most current photography or purchase a print, visit and contact him at his website mindscapefx.com or follow him on Instagram at @david_wilson_mfx . David teaches Art 35 Digital Photography at College of the Redwoods.