Picture-perfect cherry blossoms at the Tidal Basin, but rough weather looms ahead

Rain, gusty winds and temperatures near or below freezing are in the forecast , which doesn’t bode well for the D.C. cherry blossoms, now a few days past peak bloom. Predicted lows near 30 downtown Thursday night and Friday night shouldn’t kill the blossoms, but winds gusting near or past 30 mph Thursday and Friday will probably start blowing petals off the blossoms. Unusually warm weather late last week and this past weekend propelled the Yoshino cherry trees at the Tidal Basin from stage 4, peduncle elongation, to peak bloom in only four days. Peak bloom occurred on March 28 after near-record warmth last week accelerated the bloom.This year’s peak bloom occurred four days ahead of the 30-year-average date of April 1 and almost a week ahead of the 100-year-average date of April 3. March 15, 1990, marks the earliest peak bloom on record, while April 18, 1958, was the latest. Last year, peak bloom occurred on March 20, tied for the third-earliest on record.The trend toward earlier peak blooms has been even more pronounced in Japan, where the cherry blossoms peaked this past Friday, the earliest in more than 1,200 years of records .The Trust for the National Mall is broadcasting live footage of the cherry blossoms around the Tidal Basin so everyone can view the splendor of the bloom.I traveled to D.C. early Tuesday morning to photograph the cherry blossoms at sunrise. Parking around the Tidal Basin is restricted this year due to the coronavirus pandemic, so I took Metro and only stayed in the District for about two hours, long enough to capture photos for this article and to get a shot for next year’s calendar.The Tidal Basin crowd was small compared with past years, and everyone I saw wore masks and practiced good social distancing. The photographers around me set up tripods at least six feet apart, and the overall mood of everyone seemed more relaxed compared with past years.The weather Tuesday morning was perfect for photography and blossom-watching. The sky was clear, the wind was light and the temperature was comfortably cool. I sat on the edge of the basin and dangled my feet toward the water below. My tripod was set at 18 inches above the ground, so I didn’t have to stand up to photograph.A few joggers and dog walkers circled the trail behind me, and a couple sat down with food and beverages to enjoy breakfast surrounded by blossoms. During sunrise, a cormorant bird surfaced in the Tidal Basin with a fish and briefly stole the show from the blossoms. I captured a photo of the cormorant with the fish and have included it in this article.While our best blossom-viewing days are probably behind us, I have assembled photos in this post to remember the beauty of the bloom this year.