Moon Trees

A striking photograph from Montana shows a waning gibbous moon hanging in a clear blue sky above trees turning with the early autumn season. The image, taken on a Wednesday in September, pairs bright fall foliage with the daytime moon. Weather photography of seasonal skies like this tends to draw warm reactions as autumn gets underway across the northern United States.

In 1971, an Apollo 14 astronaut carried around 500 tree seeds to the Moon. After returning, the seeds were germinated and planted across the United States and elsewhere, growing into tall, mature trees known as the Moon Trees. Half a century later, many still stand, and the story of this unusual space experiment is being shared widely online.