Call them whatever you want, but red spider lilies, like so many other heirloom plants, are a subtle roadmap linking generous gardeners.
One of the smiles they bring to me is how, when I see them flowering all over small towns and older gardens, I am reminded of a vast, silent web of disparate gardeners. Because most are passalongs from other gardeners rather than store-bought, they have been shared hand, both over and under the fence; when they show up, they are a testament to connections between gardeners.
Descriptive common plant names vary widely, leading to much confusion. And most folks are entrenched in how they defend what they learned from someone else. It’s like pulling teeth, trying to get folks on the Mississippi Gardening FaceBook page to understand that the spring blooming shrub named Philadelphus can be rightfully called both English dogwood and mock orange. Same plant.
I see this all the time, through all seasons. One person’s Liriope is another person’s monkey grass; what I call snake plant, my grandmother called mother-in-law tongue. And is the popular hanging basket jewel airplane plant, or spider plant?
The one that has set me off most recently is the airy, spidery flowers of the late summer and early fall-blooming bulbs officially named Lycoris radiata, which pop up seemingly overnight on leafless stalks, giving rise to descriptive folk names including spider lily, surprise lily, magic lily, resurrection lily, and naked ladies, all which are also given to their taller, earlier-flowering cousin with the pink trumpet (Lycoris squamigera). It’s also called hurricane lily because it usually blooms right after a hard late summer rain.
Though there are species in cream, pink, and golden yellow, the most common are usually red. The flowers are followed within a few weeks by low clumps of green leaves with a pale stripe; they remain well into spring, then, like daffodils, die down about the time to start mowing again. Surprising to some folks, the faded flowers often set little balls of seed which spread the plants around where they often create unexpected colonies that across cemeteries and old homesites.
They are often seen flowering under shade trees which lose their leaves in the fall providing the winter and spring sunshine the leaves need to make the buds for flowers that will shoot up months later.
And now’s the time to gather a few for your own garden. Though they can easily be ordered online, if you have permission to snag a few from a friend or relative’s yard this is actually the best time to move the heirloom bulbs, when they are flowering and you can tell where they are. They are barely beginning to grow roots, and leaves are a month away, so it won’t disrupt the flowers for next year. They are so durable I just discovered a handful of forgotten unplanted bulbs, full bloom, in a pot with no soil.
I am relocating a couple dozen this week, cutting the flowers for a vase in my dining room and digging and dividing the bulbs. I plant some back in the hole from which they were pried, and sticking the rest here are then, including (pardon my guerilla gardening ways) along my walks through the neighborhood where I think some bulbs are needed, including around schoolyards where the flowers won’t get mowed.
The only thing I ask of others, is if you try to rescue some, don’t take them all; leave a few for others down the line. And be proud that when yours bloom, they signal your being part of the passalong plant tribe.
Felder Rushing is a Mississippi author, columnist, and host of the “Gestalt Gardener” on MPB Think Radio. Email gardening questions to rushingfelder@yahoo.com.
