I took a sunrise snowshoe a few mornings ago and the air was full of ice crystals. When conditions are right a parhelion, or more commonly called a sun dog, may occur. It’s basically the same principle as what causes a rainbow and is the diffraction of sunlight through the ice crystals in the air. This image actually shows ice crystals in the air when viewed full size (but not at the size I post on the internet unfortunately). You may notice the two Barrow’s goldeneyes in flight beneath the sun dog as well which was another element I thought made this image worth sharing.