California's super bloom continues to explode with color: How long will it last?

Orange, yellow and purple wildflowers paint the hills of the Tremblor Range, April 6, 2017 at Carrizo Plain National Monument near Taft, California. After years of drought an explosion of wildflowers in southern and central California is drawing record crowds to see the rare abundance of color called a super bloom. less Orange, yellow and purple wildflowers paint the hills of the Tremblor Range, April 6, 2017 at Carrizo Plain National Monument near Taft, California. After years of drought an explosion of wildflowers in ... more Photo: ROBYN BECK/AFP/Getty Images Photo: ROBYN BECK/AFP/Getty Images Image 1 of / 100 Caption Close California's super bloom continues to explode with color: How long will it last? 1 / 100 Back to Gallery

California continues to be awash in massive patches of brilliant color as wildflowers burst in profusion, carpeting the state's undulating hills and grassy valleys.

But if you want to experience the so-called "super bloom," you better get out there now as the color is fading fast.

"The rainy season shut off pretty quickly in Southern California and things dried up," said Richard Minnich, a professor of geography in the Earth Sciences Department at the University of California, Riverside. "The lower elevations such as Death Valley and Anza-Borrego are all done. You've got to go the higher-elevations such as above 4,000 feet in Joshua Tree or the Mojave Desert to see the flowers right now."

Carrizo Plain National Monument, a five-hour drive from San Francisco, has possibly this season's best floral display and over the weekend, Facebook and Instagram were filled with images from the park, a vast stretch of grassland.

"You definitely have a feeling of being at a very unique place at just the right time," said Darren Peck, a meteorologist with Fox 40 in Sacramento, who visited the park over the weekend and photographed the spectacle. "It's kind of surreal that way as you're seeing the landscape as if it's an over-exaggeration."

The flowers are still abundant but past peak. "We're still seeing some good displays of yellow," a voice recording for the park's main number stated on April 16. "However most of our other colors are gone or will be gone soon."

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Peck also visited the park earlier in the month and said the trifecta of color — yellow, orange and purple flowers — was magnificent. This past weekend he mainly looked out over seas of yellow.

"You could tell the flowers were in the process of wilting in your eyes," he said. "I wouldn't go this weekend and expect to see the triple color."

Peck added that if you can't make it to Central or Southern California for the wildflowers, there are many places near the Bay Area to see them.

"We're not going to have a super bloom in Northern California, but we're still going to get a show in the next two weeks," said Peck, who enjoys exploring the state's natural beauty on weekend hikes. "Last spring we had a really good flower show in Northern California. This year it's just kind of average."

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California's parched, drought-stricken landscape was soaked this winter by ceaseless storms, creating the perfect conditions for wildflowers, as reported previously on SFGATE.

The flowers were especially abundant in Central and Southern California where the climate is suited to floral growth.

"The southern California deserts are having the finest spring bloom since the 'once in a lifetime' bloom of 2005," Minnich told SFGATE in March. "In this world of invasive grasses and mustards that outcompete our native wildflowers, this year's outstanding bloom is not only a result of heavy rainfall this winter, but also the collapse of invasive species during drought over the past 5 years."

Minnich added: "The best blooms often occur in the first wet winter following protracted drought, when there is limited interference from sparse exotic annuals."