Carrizo Plain National Monument
Santa Margarita, California
April 24-27, 2023
The main draw of a super bloom is the solid blanket of fragrant flowers covering fields, hillsides, and mountains. Photography can never convey the actual sensation of standing in the midst of the vast floral extravaganza.
As much as I like trying to share the sheer magnitude of a super bloom, I also like focusing closely on the individual flowers that make up the bloom, like getting to know an individual character in an ensemble cast. Often, macro photography can reveal more effectively the beauty, subtlety and magic of the many forms of flowers.
Over the 4-6 week period of a super bloom, a variety of flower species appear in succession, like slowly rolling waves of changing shapes and colors. So depending on whether you come at the beginning, middle or end, you will see a different palette of blooms. Yellows – with hints of gold and orange – were the dominant colors on this visit. Even when pinks or blues were sprinkled generously among them, the yellows outshone everything else.
During this trip, I did not focus on individuals as much as I have in the past. However, below are some of the characters that made up the beauty and richness of the Carrizo Plain super bloom.
Most of the flowers I’ve been able to identify but a few haven’t. Those labels may come later.
Flowers grow in as many diverse hues, forms, designs and geometric shapes as anything on earth. They capture the full celebration of colors and throw them together in brilliant, intricate patterns. Awe and joy are my inescapable response.
Please leave a comment below so I know you were here!
Beautiful photos and excellent commentary, thanks Carla!
Rob, Thank you! Enjoy the spring flowers!
Beautiful flowers and wonderful observations and photos
Super Duper. Great photos Carla!
Thanks for sharing! And love that you ID your flora and fauna. Found a “neat” tool on Google – when you see the search box on Google, to the right is an icon of a camera which lets you search by image – if you are on your phone, it goes to your recent images taken, and will search. Very handy for IDing plants, etc. On your laptop, you can direct it to where ever you have your photos saved. Or, as I have often done, I capture an image on my monitor, save it as a .jpg on my desktop, then do the image search. Best to you!