The glass is half full or the glass is half empty each convey a certain outlook on life, one which welcomes optimism, the other offering a shrug towards pessimism. Those who garden, who work and play in the natural world, live in the present moment while observing, planning, planting, weeding, pruning, and sometimes harvesting. But gardeners also keep their eyes and hearts firmly fixed on the future–from the short-term seasonal process of growing vegetables to the very long-term nurturing of large shade trees, well aware that they will never see the trees in maturity.
This Red Spider Lily, Lycoris radiata, is recently emerged from its dormant, bulb state, awakened by the rains of late summer. So far, only one of the umbel flowers has opened; it will take a few more days for the other six umbels to follow, but follow they will, the flower reaching full bloom.
I don’t recall when I dug the hole and sunk the bulb into the ground, but I know that I did so with the understanding that it would take a year or more before the bulb created any sort of bloom and I was willing to wait for that future event. I also knew that the chances were good that the bulb and its seasonal flowering would have a future each August or September: fleshy scape emerging from the soil, stunning flowers dotting the garden scarlet, evergreen, grassy foliage gracing winter’s view. While this spider lily isn’t quite half full, it’s on its way to glorious blooming.
With a garden, all that is required is to exercise patience and look to the future.
My Gardener Says... 
It’s understandable that gardeners, seeing to many things grow, would be on the glass-half-full side of the line.
Familiar with the white spider lilies of east Texas but not this red one, I looked it up in Wikipedia: “Lycoris radiata, known as the red spider lily, red magic lily, corpse flower, or equinox flower, is a plant in the amaryllis family, Amaryllidaceae, subfamily Amaryllidoideae. Originally from China, Japan, Korea and Nepal and from there to the United States and elsewhere…. It flowers in the late summer or autumn, often in response to heavy rainfall. The common name hurricane lily refers to this characteristic, as do other common names, such as resurrection lily these may be used for the genus as a whole.”
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Oops, that was supposed to be “so many.”
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Yup, that’s the plant! I have 8 or 10 bulbs of this beauty scattered around my garden and I never remember where they are until the show up in late August or September, whenever the rains happen. I had to move some from my now-blasting sun front garden to my part sun back garden, so I don’t know if those will happen this year or if I have to wait another year for them. But they’re always a nice thing to see!
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What a beauty! I
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It gets prettier, too!
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Enjoy the show!
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Will do!
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Hi Tina! I wholeheartedly agree–gardening is an exercise in measured, patient optimism. We are constantly investing in the future, diversifying, and eventually (or not) seeing the fruits of our labor. It is humbling and inspiring.
Still waiting on my spider lilies and oxblood lilies this year, but that’s okay, I can be patient. Yours may be slowly waking up, but that one bloom is gorgeous!
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Thanks, Mary–flower is completely open today and there’s another stalk arisen from the soil! I have more of these and the Schoolhouse lilies, but so far, there are only a couple of fall lilies up and active. More to come, fingers-crossed.
I like your “humbling and inspiring”–how true that is, also, I’d add life affirming, each and every day.
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This is an inspiring post. I was away for much of the hot drought and came home to an unhappy garden. But, when I could finally face it, I searched my beds and found many survivors and plants reappearing.
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Well, I’m glad you could get away from the heat, it wasn’t much fun. I know you’ve chosen hardy plants for your garden, so I’m not surprised that they’re not defeated by that hellish summer. Onward to a lovely autumn!
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Onward…
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I remember seeing red lilies in the past, but I’m not certain they were these red lilies, since I saw all of them later in the fall. In one Arkansas town, they filled the medians along the main street; it certainly was an impressive sight. I do remember seeing ‘something’ red at the Armand Bayou nature center some years ago. Perhaps it’s time to stop by and see if they’ve emerged again.
The lily here that most resembles these beauties is our Crinum americanum, or swamp lily. That one I can recognize!
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Oh yeah, those swap lilies are beauties! And native! Alas, my red fall lilies (I grow 2 kinds) are not native, but they are common in Texas and throughout the southeast.
I think you asked me a while back if I had rain lilies and I said ‘no, but I had them in the past’. Well, this week, one opened and I’m chuffed! Worth another post and I think I’ll see about getting more bulbs!
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That’s a lily to be anticipated…but aren’t most so? Gardeners have to be among the more patient of folks, working now and waiting for the results down the path. This one certainly is worth that wait.
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