{"id":31062,"date":"2026-04-14T01:00:00","date_gmt":"2026-04-14T11:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/darkerview.com\/wordpress\/?p=31062"},"modified":"2026-04-12T21:14:37","modified_gmt":"2026-04-13T07:14:37","slug":"bloom-in-the-lava","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/darkerview.com\/wordpress\/?p=31062","title":{"rendered":"Bloom in the Lava"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>Hawai&#8217;i is not known for the sort of mass blooms that occur across large sections of the arid Southwestern US in years of favorable rainfall.  But a smaller version does occasionally occur across the younger lava flows around Waikoloa and Kiholo.<\/p>\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\n<figure class=\"alignright size-thumbnail\"><a href=\"https:\/\/darkerview.com\/wordpress\/?attachment_id=31059\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" width=\"200\" height=\"200\" src=\"https:\/\/darkerview.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/IMG_8848-200x200.jpg\" alt=\"A spring bloom in the Waikoloa lava fields with bright yellow Dahlberg daisies (Thymophylla tenuiloba) carpeting the ground\" class=\"wp-image-31059\"\/><\/a><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">A spring bloom in the Waikoloa lava fields with bright yellow Dahlberg daisies (Thymophylla tenuiloba) carpeting the ground<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n<p>Spring storms have brought several inches of rain to the normally arid Waikoloa area, the soils are saturated.  A few species of wildflower have taken advantage of the conditions to bloom en-mass.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The primary species is Dahlberg daisy (Thymophylla tenuiloba) carpeting many acres in a bright yellow show.  Among the rough terrian of rock and mesquite it is rather pretty.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Dalhberg daisy is an invasive, probably imported as an ornamental, but this short lived annual does not seem to have any worrisome ecological impacts and is not a high priority for eradication.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<!--more-->\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\n<figure class=\"alignleft size-thumbnail\"><a href=\"https:\/\/darkerview.com\/wordpress\/?attachment_id=31060\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" width=\"200\" height=\"200\" src=\"https:\/\/darkerview.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/CM24-80-26100-DC-200x200.jpg\" alt=\"A spring bloom in the Waikoloa lava fields with bright yellow Dahlberg daisies (Thymophylla tenuiloba) carpeting the ground\" class=\"wp-image-31060\"\/><\/a><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">A spring bloom in the Waikoloa lava fields with bright yellow Dahlberg daisies (Thymophylla tenuiloba) carpeting the ground<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n<p>The youngest of flows do not have the soil necessary to support a large plant assemblage.  While the older flows, thousands of years old, are generally carpeted in deep grasses.  Flows of a more modest age however have large expanses of normally barren rock among the mesquite trees that are ideal for a carpet of flowers to form given the right conditions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The most notable blooms I have currently noted are above the Queen Ka&#8217;ahumanu Highway near Kiholo and along Waikoloa Road, at the lower end and again in the area just makai of Waikoloa Village.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Hawai&#8217;i is not known for the sort of mass blooms that occur across large sections of the arid Southwestern US in years of favorable rainfall. But a smaller version does occasionally occur across the younger lava flows around Waikoloa and Kiholo. Spring storms have brought several inches of rain to the normally arid Waikoloa area, &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/darkerview.com\/wordpress\/?p=31062\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;Bloom in the Lava&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":31059,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[2002],"tags":[2992,1316,2989,919,259,2991,2990,181,1317],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/darkerview.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/IMG_8848.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/darkerview.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31062"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/darkerview.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/darkerview.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/darkerview.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/darkerview.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=31062"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/darkerview.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31062\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":31065,"href":"https:\/\/darkerview.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31062\/revisions\/31065"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/darkerview.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/31059"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/darkerview.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=31062"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/darkerview.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=31062"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/darkerview.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=31062"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}