Is this a so-called “super bloom” year in Death Valley? The term seems subjective, and there does not seem to be a clear demarcation between a really great bloom (which this season is certainly providing) and a super bloom. From what we saw in late February, I think there’s a case for calling 2026 one of the exceptional super bloom years.
There were lots of wildflowers where I photographed this scene at the southern end of the valley. Extensive fields of desert gold stretched across gravel fans and up hillsides. Pinkish sand verbena covered lower, sandy areas. (It is subtle, but if you look closely you can see the pink-purple color between the foreground yellow flowers and the shadowed hill.) Colorful clumps of purple phacelia were everywhere.
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G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer and visual opportunist. His book, “California’s Fall Color: A Photographer’s Guide to Autumn in the Sierra” (Heyday Books) is available directly from him. Blog | Bluesky | Mastodon | Substack Notes | Flickr | Email
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Hi Brenda,
First off, I enjoyed your DEVA article and photographs at your blog. Nice work!
About “more realistically than I saw on Petapixel,” well… we know how easy it is to push things to a point where the result is more aspirational than real. I’m not necessarily against that, and I don’t think that all photographs have to aspire to being “real,” but when they make that claim explicitly or implicitly I hope that the photographs stop short of pure fantasy!
But that does point out that from looking at some photos and reading some articles, a person unfamiliar with DEVA might expect the entire valley to be covered in bright flowers, from salt flat to mountain peak!
That’s not exactly what happens, but with a bit of sleuthing and keeping your eyes open, the flowers are certainly there. I think I have more interesting photographs of the flowers coming up, but that one sure gives an idea of the expanse of desert gold that we saw. It was quite spectacular!
Dan
Lovely image! Your image certainly shows it more realistically than those I just saw on Petapixel! It was really looking nice when we left – and we had to leave, sadly, to pick up a print in a show that ended and get back to bay area for appointments. Darn. At least I have images from 2016’s super super bloom.