Spring Flowers

California Poppies and Lupine blooming alongside Highway 15 in Southern California. The fields and slopes are awash in Spring color and it is just amazing!

Lake Poway in Bloom

Lupine and California Poppies, Lake Poway. A couple of us hiked around Lake Poway on Sunday morning. It is absolutely drenched in wildflowers: poppies everywhere; two or three species of Lupine; two species of Phacelia in stunning blue and lavender; huge spikes of Agave and much more. It's even more amazing to see given the huge fires that ripped through this area in the past. You can still see the charred black carcasses of trees throughout the landscape surround by this profusion of flowers and, in some cases, new sprouts coming from the root base of bushes and trees or even out of the blackened branches on the ancient, huge, old oaks trees. Of course, poppies and lupine are specialists in taking advantage of areas cleared by fire. Still, you would hardly ever notice a fire had been through there unless you looked for the signs.

Lupine

Lupine species, Mission Trails Park, San Diego County, California. This was one of three species of Lupine I saw while hiking in Mission Trails Park on Sunday. I have no idea which species it is. A quick look at pictures on the Internet showed similarities to Prarie Lupine (wrong state though) or maybe Bush Lupine. However, California has 82 species of Lupine of which I've seen perhaps six. I may never know their names but they do make a stunning display as they, along with the poppies, cover disturbed hillsides with blue and orange. Apparently, both grow well in areas that have previously burned. We had a huge fire in Mission Trails Park two years ago and, while at the time it was totally scary and awful, it apparently left a silver or perhaps blue and orange lining.

Spring Flowers

Here's a picture of the California Poppies and the wild Lupine in bloom off the side of U.S. Hwy. 15 on the road to the Santa Rosa Ecological Preserve. It's gotten hot now and the flowers are starting to taper off. It was a glorious Spring!

Lupine

Here's a close-up of the Lupine growing along Highway 805. They have a whole big patch of it growing making a very dramatic display.

Spring Flowers Along Highway 805

Spring is really gorgeous in San Diego. Highway maintenance has planted all sorts of amazing flowers that just light up in Spring. There are huge swaths of California poppies and even bigger stretches of purple ice plant. This patch has a beautiful mix of Lupine and California Poppies. I used my little pocket camera but it's nice enough that I may need to haul the Nikon to work with me tomorrow (heavy bulky thing that it is...). Stay tuned.