April Poppies!

After our winter of rain, we had a few weeks of spring weather. There were lots of comments about a #superbloom, so of course I had to visit the poppy reserve and see for myself. This was from about 2 weeks ago. It did not disappoint!

There were fields of orange

Lots of orange!

Poppies stay closed when it's overcast or windy, so early in the morning, they weren't as open. The fields were still pretty though.

A bit less bright, but still everywhere.

Poppies everywhere!

There were some areas where the yellow wild flowers were more prevalent:

Yellow fields on the west side of the park

Yellow and orange blending together

Up close, the color variations in the poppies are easier to see:

Yellow and orange.

Bi-colored and orange

There are many other flowers besides the California poppies, but they only really standout in close-ups!

Clover

White flowers

In addition to the plants, the desert wild life was out too:

From the friendly...

... to the not so friendly!

The super-bloom lived up to it's billing! It's already getting hot now (and windy), so I'm sure the flowers will be gone soon. The ones in my garden will stick around longer. But that's part of what makes the big fields of wild ones so special - the golden hills of California only stick around for a bit!

April Bloom Day

Time for Bloom Day, hosted by Carol at May Dreams Garden! There are so many things blooming all over the world. I don't have pictures of all my blooms, but just a couple that caught my eye after a week-long work trip.

The poppies are blooming everywhere except the planting beds. I wonder if there's any chance of them being as well behaved as Gerhard's? There's a particularly large clump in the dry stream bed:

Poppies plus Cassia (or Senna) on the hill side

More poppies and ice plant on the rest of the hill side

 It seems like the ice plant is blooming less than last year. I'm not sure why there is a random pillow (?!?) in the middle of the hillside. This still part needs a lot of clean up. That's what Easter is for!

My new iris is blooming! It's in a container in the back of one of the large planting beds. It's doing surprisingly well. I really like the color. 

I think like this is like Carol's variety name: "there's a tag somewhere"

 This combo of yucca and daisies makes me look like I plan things or something:

I don't, but i need to get more of that color daisies...

 And last - these aren't flowers, but they are growing and so cute!

Baby hummingbirds! 

Happy Gardening Bloggers' Bloom Day! Carol has many more blogs to look at in her comments!

Spring Inspiration - Huntington in March

Just some pictures from the Huntington a few weekends ago... I haven't been home enough to make a ton of spring progress in my own garden, but my projects continue to slowly get checked off.

These are totally random, just things I found pretty or inspirational as I continue spring clean up:

Swoon... I sense a dangerous plant crush developing!

A gorgeous combination of texture and color!

The Jade vine was blooming!

 That color blows mind... If it wasn't for the fact it would take over my house before it bloomed, I would try it as a house plant.

Spring in the tea garden

Swoon some more...

 I want some of those flowers, even though they won't want the desert!

I love this view 

 I'm pretty sure no amount of spring cleanup will make my garden look like that, but at least I can have the next flowers:

So pretty and delicate!

 This one might appear in my garden one day too... The jury is still out on whether my plant survived the winter:

Big poofy red flowers

I can't​ wait to get back out there!