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Lupine flowers and fog along Bald Hills Road, California.<\/p>\n
Adam Jones\/Getty Images<\/p>\n
In an\u00a0Instagram video<\/a> posted Friday by Redwood National Park<\/a>, a botanist strikes poses within a \u201csuperbloom,\u201d beckoning visitors to come experience the elaborate display of purple flowers. \u201cI have something to show you,\u201d the employee says while reclining in the grass, as the camera pans up to reveal a sea of spiky lupine flowers behind her.<\/p>\n \u201cLupine Superbloom at Redwood,\u201d purple text overlay reads.<\/p>\n Article continues below this ad<\/p>\n The invitation may feel surprising, considering California\u2019s fraught relationship with its\u00a0superblooms\u00a0and the environmental damage<\/a> the springtime spectacles have been known to cause. Some conservationists even take issue with the word \u201csuperbloom<\/a>,\u201d due to its tendency to draw unruly crowds that trample the flowers.<\/p>\n But the official announcement is not without precedent: Death Valley National Park trumpeted its own bloom in March<\/a>. And certainly, the National Park Service has good reasons for wanting to educate Americans about the treasures within their national parks. In grabbing viewers\u2019 attention with information about where to see a superbloom, the botanist also gets to explain why they\u2019ve proliferated this year \u2014 and, crucially, how to responsibly appreciate them.<\/p>\n Lupine flowers in Redwood National Park in California.<\/p>\n Jeff Foott\/Getty Images<\/p>\n Off a remote road within Redwood National Park, more than a six-hour drive from San Francisco, this sporadic lupine bloom mostly attracts locals and people who happen to be visiting the park already. This year, it sprang up in an area just before the Lyons Ranch\u00a0Trailhead, \u201ccovering the Bald Hills with their gorgeous purple color and sweet scent,\u201d according to the national park\u2019s social media post, and is expected to last through May.<\/p>\n Article continues below this ad<\/p>\n Make SFGATE a preferred source so your search results prioritize writing by actual people, not AI.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Add Preferred Source<\/p>\n <\/a><\/p>\n The reason there\u2019s a bloom this year, the park botanist explains, has to do with a prescribed fire that was intentionally set to burn off flammable materials and prevent catastrophic wildfire.<\/p>\n \u201cWe are returning fire to this landscape, and we’re realizing that one year after a fire, we end up with a lot of vegetative lupines,\u201d the botanist says. \u201cBut two years post-burn, just like the burn that they did in this drainage two years ago, we end up with a lupine superbloom.\u201d<\/p>\n The unnamed botanist goes on to explain that while there are no park-designated trails in the area, elk and other animals have created informal trails that humans can follow. \u201cMake sure you stay on those trails,\u201d she says, giving safety warnings. \u201c… And of course, we never pick the lupine.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n Article continues below this ad<\/p>\n Lupine flowers in Redwood National Park in California.<\/p>\n Micha Pawlitzki\/Getty Images<\/p>\n For Greg King, the executive director of the Siskiyou Land Trust and author of \u201cThe Ghost Forest<\/a>,\u201d a book that covers the history of America\u2019s redwood parks, it feels ironic for a national park to be advertising a superbloom on social media.\u00a0King remembers the superbloom\u00a0at Folsom Lake in 2021, when everything got trampled, he says, and that was largely thanks to social media.\u00a0<\/p>\n But King also wanted to stress that he appreciates the leadership of the park, and he understands there are upsides to sharing the\u00a0lupines\u00a0with a wider audience.<\/p>\n \u201cPeople need to take in the beauty of nature in order for us to better understand why we need to protect it,\u201d he told SFGATE by phone. \u201cBut given that this is a protected ecosystem, it might be better to not really advertise it. Or maybe afterward?\u201d<\/p>\n Article continues below this ad<\/p>\n In looking over the park\u2019s Friday Instagram post, King found that the video already had 712 likes after just a few hours. That troubled him. \u201cIf even a third of those people go there, that superbloom can be wrecked,\u201d he said. \u201cIf you\u2019re advertising a superbloom on social media, and you have so many followers, people are going to take your word for it and go there \u2026 it\u2019s not going to be good because it\u2019s completely unregulated. There\u2019s nobody watching.\u201d<\/p>\n Justin Legge, a naturalist and guide who leads private tours through Redwood National and State Parks, also has mixed feelings about the video. He would have preferred it to begin with the message about being gentle and not trampling the flowers, which he feels got buried, he told SFGATE. And he takes issue with the word \u201csuperbloom.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s a good bloom this year, but I don\u2019t know if the term \u2018superbloom\u2019 fits,\u201d he said. \u201cIt just gets people excited, which leads to damage.\u201d<\/p>\n Article continues below this ad<\/p>\n Legge is aware of many locals getting jazzed up about<\/a> the lupine bloom this year, and he knows photographers have been going there for wedding and prom shoots. He\u2019s also heard reports of people\u00a0standing in the flowers<\/a> and lying down on top to snap selfies for social media.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cPeople can be so annoying,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n We love national parks just as much as you do, so we have a newsletter that covers them from top to bottom.\u00a0Sign up here.<\/a><\/p>\n<\/p>\n
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