{"id":27146,"date":"2017-04-14T09:11:07","date_gmt":"2017-04-14T16:11:07","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/?p=27146"},"modified":"2017-04-14T09:25:17","modified_gmt":"2017-04-14T16:25:17","slug":"friday-fun-for-beauty-just-add-water","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/2017\/04\/14\/friday-fun-for-beauty-just-add-water\/","title":{"rendered":"Friday Fun \u2013 For Beauty, Just Add Water"},"content":{"rendered":"

Texas annually anticipates its springtime carpet of bluebonnets producing a Floral Photo Fantabula<\/em> …<\/p>\n

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But this year California is taking over the top floral spot with a Super Bloom<\/em><\/strong> rarely seen.<\/p>\n

[NOTE<\/strong><\/u>: I created free-standing GIFs, so you can't stop it to view individual photos.  If you do click on it at a certain photo, it'll open in a new window that takes a while to load – but then reverts to slideshow mode.]<\/em><\/p>\n

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Thanks to the record-breaking, drought-ending drenching California experienced this past winter, its parched desert hills and valleys are awash in a technicolor Super Bloom<\/em><\/strong> – a phantasmagorical palette that has not been seen for years and years.<\/p>\n

According to research ecologist, Cameron Barrows<\/strong>, seeds that have been dormant in the desert sands for 5, 10, or even 30 years are responding to the rains of winter, creating carpets of red, orange, yellow, and purple flowers that have drawn record crowds – and it’s easy to see why!<\/p>\n

The U.S. Department of the Interior<\/strong><\/em>, which posted photos to their <\/a>Facebook<\/a> <\/em>page, wrote:<\/p>\n

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"The Valley floor has endless expanses of yellows and purples from coreopsis, tidy tips and phacelia, with smaller patches of dozens of other species.  Not to be outdone, the Temblor Range is painted with swaths of wildflowers in oranges yellow and purple like something out of a storybook."<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

And amazingly the Super Bloom fields are so vast, they’re visible from space!<\/p>\n

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Senior environmental specialist Wendy Picht<\/strong>, notes that the poppy fields draw the largest crowds because they last the longest and are brighter than other area species, such as baby blue eyes, arroyo lupine, caterpillar phacelia, Canterbury bells, goldfields, cream cups, delphinium and blue dicks (I’m NOT<\/u> kidding, that’s what their name is – you can Google it – the fact that it’s edible … Oh, never mind)<\/em><\/p>\n

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Let's take a closer look at some of these beauties …<\/p>\n

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But she pleads with all visitors to respect the environment and STAY ON THE TRAILS<\/strong><\/em><\/u><\/span><\/span>. <\/p>\n

Granted, it may be hard to not wander afield – but for those that follow, please do Stay On The Trails<\/strong><\/em>.  What do you think – did this gal stay on a trail for her selfie?<\/p>\n

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A woman uses a selfie stick to photograph herself in a massive spring wildflower bloom caused by a wet winter in Lake Elsinore, California, U.S., March 14, 2017. REUTERS\/Lucy Nicholson<\/p><\/div>\n

The Super Bloom show started in the deserts close to the Mexican border, and has worked its way north.  If you’re in the LA Metro – or want to travel – this site has a map of the best locations.  But better hurry – the show is coming to a close soon:<\/p>\n

http:\/\/laist.com\/2017\/03\/31\/super_bloom_3_best.php<\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Texas annually anticipates its springtime carpet of bluebonnets producing a Floral Photo Fantabula … But this year California is taking over the top floral spot with a Super Bloom rarely seen. [NOTE: I created free-standing GIFs, so you can't stop it to view individual photos.  If you do click on it at a certain photo, […]<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-27146","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics","category-5-id","post-seq-1","post-parity-odd","meta-position-corners","fix"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27146","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=27146"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27146\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=27146"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=27146"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=27146"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}