Carpets of yellow, orange and gold flowers are beginning to cover Southern California's vast deserts, the Bay Area's dramatic bluffs and even near Los Angeles International Airport.
But do they add up to a “superbloom”? There is no single definition of the event, but so far this year's blooms haven't been as vibrant or abundant as those that took over swaths of California last spring following drought-busting rains. This year, too, the state received ample winter rains.
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Carpets of yellow, orange and gold flowers are beginning to cover Southern California's vast deserts, the Bay Area's dramatic bluffs and even near Los Angeles International Airport.
FILE - Visitors walk on a pathway amid fields of blooming flowers at the Antelope Valley California Poppy Reserve, Monday, April 10, 2023, in Lancaster, Calif. (AP Photo/Marcio Jose Sanchez, File)
Overlooking the Pacific Ocean, flowers bloom in Mussel Rock Park in Daly City, Calif., Monday, April 1, 2024. Carpets of tiny, rain-fed wildflowers known as "Superblooms" are appearing in parts of California and Arizona. Their arrival draws droves of visitors who stop to glimpse the flashes of color and pose for pictures. (AP Photo/Haven Daley)
Twin Peaks is carpeted with flowers in San Francisco, Monday, April 1, 2024. Carpets of tiny, rain-fed wildflowers known as "Superblooms" are appearing in parts of California and Arizona. Their arrival draws droves of visitors who stop to glimpse the flashes of color and pose for pictures. (AP Photo/Haven Daley)
Flowers bloom along the runways as a jet takes off at the Los Angeles International Airport in Los Angeles Friday, April 12, 2024. Carpets of tiny, rain-fed wildflowers known as "Superblooms" are appearing in parts of California and Arizona. Their arrival draws droves of visitors who stop to glimpse the flashes of color and pose for pictures. (AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes)
Flowers bloom along the runways as a Delta Airlines jet takes off at the Los Angeles International Airport in Los Angeles Friday, April 12, 2024. Carpets of tiny, rain-fed wildflowers known as "Superblooms" are appearing in parts of California and Arizona. Their arrival draws droves of visitors who stop to glimpse the flashes of color and pose for pictures. (AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes)
Flowers carpet the ground around the runways as a jet taxis at the Los Angeles International Airport in Los Angeles Friday, April 12, 2024. Carpets of tiny, rain-fed wildflowers known as "Superblooms" are appearing in parts of California and Arizona. Their arrival draws droves of visitors who stop to glimpse the flashes of color and pose for pictures. (AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes)
Flowers carpet the ground near the runways at the Los Angeles International Airport in Los Angeles Friday, April 12, 2024. Carpets of tiny, rain-fed wildflowers known as "Superblooms" are appearing in parts of California and Arizona. Their arrival draws droves of visitors who stop to glimpse the flashes of color and pose for pictures. (AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes)
Overlooking the Pacific Ocean, flowers bloom in Mussel Rock Park in Daly City, Calif., Monday, April 1, 2024. Carpets of tiny, rain-fed wildflowers known as "Superblooms" are appearing in parts of California and Arizona. Their arrival draws droves of visitors who stop to glimpse the flashes of color and pose for pictures. (AP Photo/Haven Daley)
After especially wet winters, bursts of color may appear in the spring, drawing droves of visitors to California and other parts of the Southwest to glimpse the flowering fields and pose for pictures.
Here are some key facts about the natural spectacle:
Scientists don't agree on any one definition. Across California and Arizona, there are stretches of desert that can quickly transform into dense fields of wildflowers, since seeds lie dormant in the soil and then germinate and blossom at around the same time.
A recent study found that such widespread blooms, which have been visible by satellite imagery in some years, take place after seasons with greater than 30% average precipitation, said Naomi Fraga, director of conservation programs at the California Botanic Garden, east of Los Angeles.
No, according to Fraga. That's because there isn't a huge diversity in the flowers that have blossomed in places like California's Death Valley.
This year's blooms aren't as large or as dense as wildflowers in past years, she said.
“When I think of superblooms, I think of a bloom that is so extraordinary, that’s a once in a lifetime event,” Fraga said, adding that the wildflower display this year “still makes a beautiful show.”
Last spring, early April visitors to Southern California's Antelope Valley California Poppy Reserve were treated to dazzling orange displays of the state flower. But around the same time this year, the fields were absent of the orange blooms, with the reserve's officials posting that the window for an impressive show was becoming “increasingly narrow.”
In Death Valley, one of the driest places on earth, stretches of desert are dotted with gold thanks to sunflowers that emerged after an especially wet winter and spring.
Whether that constitutes a superbloom is “really in the eye of the beholder,” said Evan Meyer, executive director of the California-based nonprofit Theodore Payne Foundation, which works to preserve California's native plants.
April is typically the peak month for spring wildflowers, but in high-elevation places they can continue to blossom later into the spring.
Superblooms generally refer to low-elevation desert regions, Fraga said.
“It's much more geographic than seasonal,” Meyer said. “Spring in the mountains hasn’t started, and in the low desert, it’s past its peak.”
When temperatures rise in the desert, the flowers can quickly dry out.
Experts say it might be too soon to tell.
Climate change is making precipitation patterns more erratic, but the effects on wildflowers could play out over decades or even centuries, Fraga said, since seeds stay dormant in the soil for long periods of time.
Southern California received heavy rain last summer, unlike its usually dry summers, which she said probably stimulated flowers to germinate out of season. Winter temperatures also were higher than average, so many of them were able to stay in bloom through the spring season.
“That made for a very unusual bloom,” Fraga said.
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FILE - Eli Karp, visiting from Thousand Oaks, Calif., with his family, walks in a field of blooming poppies near the Antelope Valley California Poppy Reserve, Monday, April 10, 2023, in Lancaster, Calif. (AP Photo/Marcio Jose Sanchez, File)
FILE - Visitors walk on a pathway amid fields of blooming flowers at the Antelope Valley California Poppy Reserve, Monday, April 10, 2023, in Lancaster, Calif. (AP Photo/Marcio Jose Sanchez, File)
Overlooking the Pacific Ocean, flowers bloom in Mussel Rock Park in Daly City, Calif., Monday, April 1, 2024. Carpets of tiny, rain-fed wildflowers known as "Superblooms" are appearing in parts of California and Arizona. Their arrival draws droves of visitors who stop to glimpse the flashes of color and pose for pictures. (AP Photo/Haven Daley)
Twin Peaks is carpeted with flowers in San Francisco, Monday, April 1, 2024. Carpets of tiny, rain-fed wildflowers known as "Superblooms" are appearing in parts of California and Arizona. Their arrival draws droves of visitors who stop to glimpse the flashes of color and pose for pictures. (AP Photo/Haven Daley)
Flowers bloom along the runways as a jet takes off at the Los Angeles International Airport in Los Angeles Friday, April 12, 2024. Carpets of tiny, rain-fed wildflowers known as "Superblooms" are appearing in parts of California and Arizona. Their arrival draws droves of visitors who stop to glimpse the flashes of color and pose for pictures. (AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes)
Flowers bloom along the runways as a Delta Airlines jet takes off at the Los Angeles International Airport in Los Angeles Friday, April 12, 2024. Carpets of tiny, rain-fed wildflowers known as "Superblooms" are appearing in parts of California and Arizona. Their arrival draws droves of visitors who stop to glimpse the flashes of color and pose for pictures. (AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes)
Flowers carpet the ground around the runways as a jet taxis at the Los Angeles International Airport in Los Angeles Friday, April 12, 2024. Carpets of tiny, rain-fed wildflowers known as "Superblooms" are appearing in parts of California and Arizona. Their arrival draws droves of visitors who stop to glimpse the flashes of color and pose for pictures. (AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes)
Flowers carpet the ground near the runways at the Los Angeles International Airport in Los Angeles Friday, April 12, 2024. Carpets of tiny, rain-fed wildflowers known as "Superblooms" are appearing in parts of California and Arizona. Their arrival draws droves of visitors who stop to glimpse the flashes of color and pose for pictures. (AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes)
Overlooking the Pacific Ocean, flowers bloom in Mussel Rock Park in Daly City, Calif., Monday, April 1, 2024. Carpets of tiny, rain-fed wildflowers known as "Superblooms" are appearing in parts of California and Arizona. Their arrival draws droves of visitors who stop to glimpse the flashes of color and pose for pictures. (AP Photo/Haven Daley)
NEW YORK (AP) — Donald Trump returned to Manhattan court on Friday as his hush money trial entered its 11th day, capping a frenzied second week of witness testimony.
Lawyer Keith Davidson concluded his testimony Thursday after spending nearly 6 1/2 hours on the stand over two days. He laid out for jurors details of his negotiations with Michael Cohen and the National Enquirer on behalf of Stormy Daniels and Karen McDougal, not shying away from an election night realization that his efforts might have contributed to Trump's 2016 win.
Forensic analyst Douglas Daus also took the stand, testifying about what he found on Cohen's cellphone. Among other things, Daus said Cohen had nearly 40,000 contacts saved to the device.
Thursday's proceedings included a contempt hearing over whether the former president had again violated his gag order.
Merchan heard from both sides about four more prospective violations, including comments Trump made about the jury. Prosecutors said they were seeking only fines and not jail time for the potential violations. An immediate decision was not made and it was unclear when Merchan would rule.
Prosecutors have said that Trump and others conducted a scheme to illegally influence the 2016 election by purchasing and burying salacious stories that might hurt his campaign.
Trump is accused of falsifying internal business records to cover up hush money payments — including $130,000 given to Daniels, a porn actor, by Cohen — recording them instead as legal expenses.
Trump has pleaded not guilty to 34 felony counts of falsifying business records.
The case is the first-ever criminal trial of a former U.S. president and the first of four prosecutions of Trump to reach a jury.
Currently:
— Donald Trump moves much of his White House campaign to New York
— Key players: Who’s who at Donald Trump’s hush money criminal trial
— The hush money case is just one of Trump’s legal cases. See the others here
— Trial begins for financial executive in insider trading case tied to taking Trump media firm public
Here's the latest:
Donald Trump has paid his $9,000 fine for violating the gag order in his hush money criminal trial.
The former president paid the penalty Thursday, ahead of a Friday deadline. Trump’s legal team supplied the court clerk’s office with two cashier’s checks — one for $2,000 and one for $7,000.
Judge Juan M. Merchan ordered Trump to pay the fine after holding him in contempt of court and finding that posts he made online about his ex-lawyer Michael Cohen, porn actor Stormy Daniels and the composition of the jury had violated the gag order.
Merchan is currently weighing a prosecution request to hold Trump in contempt again and fine him $1,000 for each of four more alleged violations from last week. Merchan has warned Trump that he could be jailed if he keeps breaching the gag order.
A government agency at the heart of Donald Trump’s separate classified documents criminal case got a name drop at his New York hush money trial on Friday.
Georiga Longstreet testified that she used the National Archives and Records Administration’s archive of the official presidential account on Twitter, now known as the social platform X, to help verify the authenticity of Trump’s account.
Longstreet noted that Trump’s official government account, @POTUS45, frequently reposted posts from Trump’s @realdonaldtrump account.
There was no visible reaction from Trump to the mention of the National Archives, whose pursuit of records he took from the White House to his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida after his 2020 election loss led to charges alleging that he illegally hoarded classified documents.
Georgia Longstreet, a paralegal with the Manhattan district attorney's office, was called as the next witness in Donald Trump's hush money case on Friday.
She has been assigned to the Trump case for the past year and a half and her role has been to review publicly available records relevant to the case, including Trump’s social media accounts on the social platform X — formerly known as Twitter — Facebook, LinkedIn and Truth Social.
Picking up where he left off on Thursday, Trump attorney Emil Bove plied Douglas Daus, the forensic analyst, with a set of deeply technical questions Friday meant to suggest that Michael Cohen may have doctored a 2016 recording played in court the previous day.
As evidence, Bove noted that the audio cuts off suddenly, as well as “gaps” in the handling of the phone that Daus agreed were “not ideal.”
Prosecutors say the abrupt ending of the recording was the result of Cohen receiving another call. Under questioning from Bove, Daus said there was no record of an incoming call in the phone’s metadata — but said it would be difficult to say for sure without looking at call log data from Cohen’s phone carrier.
“In many ways, we’re just going to have to take Michael Cohen’s word for it, aren’t we?” Bove said.
“Yes,” Daus replied.
With that, Bove concluded his cross-examination.
Before testimony resumed in Donald Trump's hush money trial, Judge Juan M. Merchan ruled to prevent prosecutors from showing the jury a photograph of Trump with Billy Bush and soap opera actor Arianne Zucker at the time of the infamous “Access Hollywood” recording.
Trump lawyer Todd Blanche had asked for the image to be excluded from the trial, pointing to a recent court decision overturning Harvey Weinstein’s rape conviction. In that case, the appeals court ordered a retrial because the judge had allowed testimony at trial unrelated to the allegations.
Merchan said the appeals court decision “doesn’t really factor into this” case, noting that the ruling had not laid out any new law, but nevertheless agreed to block prosecutors from introducing the photograph.
Prosecutors had said the image would help establish the timeline of the revelations about the “Access Hollywood” tape, in which Trump could be heard bragging about grabbing women without permission.
Merchan has previously ruled the 2005 tape cannot be played in court for jurors, but said prosecutors can still question witnesses about the recording.
Trump lawyer Emil Bove on Friday morning resumed cross-examination questioning of Douglas Daus, a forensic analyst at the Manhattan district attorney’s office who extracted recordings, text messages and other evidence from two of Michael Cohen’s iPhones.
Judge Juan M. Merchan started the trial day also by clarifying that Donald Trump’s gag order doesn’t prohibit him from testifying on his own behalf, apparently responding to comments the former president made after court the day before.
“The order restricting extrajudicial statements does not prevent you from testifying in any way,” Merchan said, adding that the order does not in any way limit what Trump says on the witness stand.
Merchan directed his comments to Trump and his lawyers, saying it had come to his attention that there may have been a “misunderstanding” regarding the order.
Speaking to reporters before heading into court on Friday, Donald Trump clarified comments he made the day before about his gag order, saying it does not stop him from testifying in the case but it does keep him from “talking about people and responding when they say things about me.”
After court adjourned on Thursday, Trump had responded to questions about what he’d thought of the day’s testimony.
“I’m not allowed to testify. I’m under a gag order,” he said, causing some confusion. The gag order bars him from making public statements about witnesses, jurors and some others connected to the case.
He also commented on the latest job numbers showing that U.S. employers scaled back hiring in April and said they’re “horrible.”
Donald Trump has arrived at the courthouse in Manhattan for the 11th day of his hush money trial.
Hope Hicks, who served as Donald Trump's 2016 campaign press secretary and went on to hold various roles in his White House, could testify in his hush money trial as early as Friday.
The two people who described her forthcoming appearance to The Associated Press insisted on anonymity to discuss internal trial preparations.
Hicks spoke with Trump by phone during a frenzied effort to keep his alleged affairs out of the press in the final weeks before the election.
Associated Press writers Eric Tucker in Washington and Jake Offenhartz in New York contributed to this report.
Despite not yet having testified in Donald Trump's hush money case, Michael Cohen has been very present in the courtroom — in audio recordings of conversations he had and in witness testimony.
On Thursday, jurors heard a taped call between Cohen and Keith Davidson, Stormy Daniels' former attorney, wherein Cohen could be heard telling Davidson about a conversation he'd had with someone believed to be Trump.
“I can’t even tell you how many times he said to me, ‘You know, I hate the fact that we did it.’ And my comment to him was, ‘But every person that you’ve spoken to told you it was the right move,’” Cohen said in the recording.
The panel also heard a recording of Cohen briefing Trump in September 2016 on the plan to buy former Playboy model Karen McDougal’s story. That particular recording included Cohen detailing that he'd spoken to then-Trump Organization Chief Financial Officer Allen Weisselberg about “how to set the whole thing up with funding.”
Cohen, who is the prosecution's star witness, was Trump's lawyer and personal fixer at the time.
Court proceedings in Donald Trump's hush money case will end early on Friday to accommodate an important appointment one of the jurors has in the late afternoon.
Judge Juan M. Merchan announced the scheduling change just before adjourning court on Thursday. Court will end at 3:45 p.m. Friday, about 45 minutes earlier than normal.
Donald Trump is expected to return to court Friday morning for the 11th day of his hush money trial as the second week of witness testimony wraps up.
Thursday's proceedings saw the former president facing yet another contempt hearing, this time over four more prospective violations of his gag order.
While Judge Juan M. Merchan did not immediately rule on the sanctions request from prosecutors, he told defense attorneys he was concerned about three of the potential violations — including comments that Trump made about the political makeup of the jury. Merchan said he wasn't worried about a comment Trump made last week calling former Enquirer publisher David Pecker a “nice guy.”
Prosecutors said they were only seeking fines and not jail time over the potential violations.
Trump is barred under a gag order from speaking publicly about witnesses, jurors and some others connected to the case. He was fined $9,000 on Tuesday over nine online posts.
The introduction has been updated to correct the spelling of the last name of forensic analyst Douglas Daus, from Daul.
Former President Donald Trump arrives at Manhattan criminal court in New York, on Friday, May 3, 2024. (Doug Mills/The New York Times via AP, Pool)
Former President Donald Trump appears at Manhattan criminal court before his trial in New York, Friday,, May 3, 2024. (Doug Mills/The New York Times via AP, Pool)
Former President Donald Trump appears at Manhattan criminal court before his trial in New York, Friday,, May 3, 2024. (Jeenah Moon/Pool Photo via AP)
Former President Donald Trump appears at Manhattan criminal court before his trial in New York, Friday,, May 3, 2024. (Jeenah Moon/Pool Photo via AP)
Former President Donald Trump arrives at Manhattan criminal court before his trial in New York, Thursday, May 2, 2024. (Charly Triballeau/Pool Photo via AP)
Former President Donald Trump sits inside Manhattan Criminal Court, Thursday, May 2 2024. (Mark Peterson/Pool Photo via AP)
Former President Donald Trump arrives at Manhattan criminal court before his trial in New York, Thursday, May 2, 2024. (Charly Triballeau/Pool Photo via AP)
