Originally published at: California gets a super bloom of wildflowers | Boing Boing
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Neat! 
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Now instagramers, please stay the hell away
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Too late:
Good news: Parks are protecting them by keeping people away as much as possible.
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Ok, I was there at Lake Elsinore a few years ago during a superbloom (staying on designated trails) and yes, there were a bunch of assholes ignoring rules and trampling some flowers to take selfies, and the damge to some local spots was sad and enraging, but I still don’t think that keeping people completely away is the right response. The human-caused damage was somewhat exaggerated in the media because the bloom area was huge, and only a small percentage of the overall area was trampled, and that was mostly just areas right next to the trails. There’s no way that the lack of a superbloom the following year or two was the direct result of human-caused damage, despite what the mayor of Lake Elsinore says.
(To be clear I’m mostly responding to the temporary closure of trails near Lake Elsinore here, not the efforts to reduce invasive species or limit development in sensitive areas that the article discusses)
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Keeping people on trails in delicate habitats is a good thing. Keeping people away from the splendor of nature when its beauty is at its zenith is exactly the opposite of what parks are for.
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But here’s an uncommon phenomenon that’s happening this year, and it’s great for everybody…
Especially shareholders at companies selling antihistamines.
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My backyard is almost solid California poppies right now. I’ve been working, in recent years, to turn it into a native plant (and animal) habitat, but I’ve never seen anything like it - previously they were dotted around. (Unfortunately, the rain brought other things, too - I was feeling pretty smug in that I thought I had finally gotten the weeds under control, but it turned out they were all waiting - for years - for the rain…)
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This reminds me of an SF short story I read many years ago about a space traveler/scientist who lands on a cold, long-dead planet just as the star it orbits starts brightening up before going nova. The warming sun awakens seeds that had lain dormant for millennia, and provides one last beautiful spring right before the planet is to be consumed by the exploding star.
Man, I sure hope we can get global warming under control before it’s too late…
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