That's interesting. I never knew what a sundog was (altho I have heard of them). What causes it?

Nice one...looks bigger than ones i've seen...

juanita

Sun dogs and rainbows are related and are created by similar physics - Light refracting/reflecting off and/or through moisture forms in the sky. The sun dog of this picture is the interaction of sunlight and a cloud of frost crystals. A rainbow is created with water droplets in the sky. For a rainbow, the sunlight comes from behind the viewer, strikes water droplets and are reflected off axis of the incoming light beam. Differening light frequencies are bent at differing angles and the viewer see the white light spead in a band of colors. For a rainbow, the ligft enter a water droplet, bends some, reflects off the backside of the droplet and exits the front side of the droplet, but at a much different angle than it entered.

A frost sundog is different. The light may reflect off the front side of frost flakes or frozen fog droplets. if the light passes through a frost crystal or droplet, it bends light of different colors a little differently and thus you see the light broadened into a color bands, but not as distinct as a rainbow. Therefore, you may see frost sundogs while looking toward the sun and off to the side. This winter, I saw a huge sundog in a frozen fog bank. That morning, we were blanketed with frozen fog and as the fog began to break up as sunlight came through in spots, the sundogs appeared. The sun was to my left (east) while I viewed south (90 deg to the light beam).

Sun dogs can be observed during airplane flights. When flying above the cloud tops, little sundogs can appear when viewed at 90 deg to the incoming sunlight.

Thanks for the explaination about sundogs, sorry I did not get back to answer. Jemdandy did an excellant job of explaining it.

Great picture minrose!
I have seen one last Sunday, one side like yours, I'm hoping one day I can see a two sided sundog.
...
This one, [one side only] I posted before.
Konrad

Here is a link that might be useful: Sundog

Wonderful sundog pics!
JoanMN/FL