Botanical Royalty
Rocky shoals spider lilies reign over a pre-European landscape
Our Spring 2024 Cover Story
Story and photos by Tom Poland
Approach with reverence and listen. Faint at first, you’ll hear Earth’s finest white noise. Water whispers, water murmurs as it purls, froths, and foams against bedrock. Milky-white filigrees twist and braid, a sound that begets inner peace as no other sound can.
Peering through trees you see rare botanical royalty. Lustrous green scapes topped by snow-white blooms move to swift water, a bobbing, weaving, mesmerizing dance. Accompanied by the sound of unfettered water you behold South Carolina’s most bedazzling display of nature.
The spectacle unfolds each spring in Georgia and Alabama, too. Come May–June, white and green accents adorn rivers and creeks studded by brown rocks.
Seeing rocky shoals spider lilies the first time takes your breath away. “I’ve seen little old ladies weep at their first sighting of this plant,” said the plant’s foremost expert, Larry Davenport, a professor of biological and environmental sciences at Samford University in Homewood Alabama. “The lily has become a symbol of the wild and free-flowing places of Central Alabama.”
Davenport’s words from Garden & Gun’s May 2019 issue apply to South Carolina and Georgia as well. With so many shoals beneath lakes, this majestic plant has little habitat left.
If you take your grandmother to see the ballerina-like blooms, take tissues. And understand that you are viewing a species devastated by dams, dropping water quality, and development. It should be federally listed as an endangered species.
Hymenocallis coronaria is exquisite, ephemeral, and perilous, in that much of its habitat lies beneath lakes. As the rocky shoals spider lily’s status goes, it’s a national plant of concern.
Dancing Blooms
Babylon had hanging gardens and South Carolina has billowing river gardens. You’ll find the world’s largest colony at Landsford Canal State Park in Chester County. One Sunday morning I drove up there. Kayakers darted in and out of majestic clumps, and women oohed and ahed from an observation deck.
See the dancing blooms and enjoy a concert of river song. Greenscapes support delicate flowers dancing upon a stage of rushing water—a performance you’ll not forget.
A magnificent yet difficult-to-access colony thrives on Stevens Creek in McCormick County. Funding from the South Carolina Conservation Bank and South Carolina Native Plant Society helped Naturaland Trust provide a 13-acre refuge for this stunning colony. Support came from Upper Savannah Land Trust as well.
A survivor from the pre-European landscape, shoals lilies prefer rocky rivers, plummeting elevation, and clean, free-flowing water. Translation, no dams. When you take in the shoals lilies at Stevens Creek and Landsford Canal you can glimpse what the Piedmont looked like before big dams rose like massive granite outcroppings.
A bit elusive, other shoals lilies exist in South Carolina. I’m told a colony exists along the Savannah River Bluffs Heritage Preserve near North Augusta. I hear, too, that Lockhart in Union County has shoals lilies on the Broad River, and I’ve seen places where people have tried to establish colonies. In Ware Shoals several clumps bring beauty to the Saluda River near Irvin Pitts Memorial Park. You can see another human-assisted occurrence in Columbia where the Broad River approaches the Saluda River east of the Interstate 126 Bridge.
Duplicating nature isn’t easy. Davenport tried. “Over the years, I’ve been involved in several projects to establish, or reestablish, lily populations, either by seeds or bulbs. So far I’m batting an embarrassing .000.”
A Lemony-Sugary Fragrance
In 1783 William Bartram, the first botanist to observe this species, described it as the “odoriferous Pancratium fluitans which almost alone possesses the little rocky islets.” (The flowers are now known as Hymenocallis coronaria.) His sighting was at the cataracts of the Savannah River near Augusta, Georgia. Then, as now, the plant loves rocks in swift water. Alas, man’s dams did away with many rocky shoals. And now other troubles have arrived. “Two fairly new problems that ‘our’ (Alabama) lilies suffer from are invasive plants—especially elephant-ears or taro—and scouring due to trees uprooted by stream bank collapse,” Davenport says.
Each spring I make expeditions to the rocky shoals spider lilies in South Carolina and Georgia for a simple reason: They offer photographers, artists, writers, and nature lovers a dream. You lose track of time and worries in the presence of Hymenocallis coronaria, this aquatic, perennial flowering plant species endemic to the Southeast.
Last spring I visited Stevens Creek three times. The first time, heavy rains had the creek high and heavy with silt. Most lilies hid, submerged. A few days later a good many lilies tossed their beautiful crowns about. My third visit found the creek at normal flow but peak bloom had passed. Even so, beauty aplenty lingered. I waded out and leaned over a pristine bloom to take in its fragrance. A lemony-sugary perfume rose, subtle but heady. To see shoals lilies is to see butterflies and hummingbirds, too.
Exquisite and ephemeral, the blooms open at night and last but a day. Long, pure white tepals and staminal cup, green bracts, mint green accents, gold stamens, and bright-to-dark green stigma bring that arachnid moniker into play. I prefer crown. Even better, diadem. After all, we’re talking botanical royalty here.
Our Tampering Ways
Find shoals lilies and you’ll see man’s attempts to harness water’s power. Uphill from the shoals lilies at Stevens Creek stands an old mill a channel once fed. At Landsford Canal a beautiful stone canal rendered the river commercially navigable from 1820 to 1835.
In Georgia, a splendid colony survives four minutes as the osprey flies from the South Carolina border, and, yes, ospreys haunt the shoals. Long ago men dynamited a channel through its midst so Petersburg boats could get through. That the shoals exist is miraculous. This breathtaking colony beat not one but two dams—Russell and J. Strom Thurmond (Clarks Hill). Maybe you haven’t heard of it, but naturalists, botanists, kayakers, and artists have. Writers, too. Anthony Shoals, wild and accessible by land with great difficulty, draws me each spring.
Artist Philip Juras painted Anthony Shoals in oil on canvas. His essay in Bartram’s Living Legacy: The Travels and the Nature of the South, beautifully describes the setting and its significance. His words apply to Stevens Creek and Landsford Canal.
“There is no river scene in the Piedmont of northeast Georgia more stunning than Anthony Shoals on the Broad River. Perhaps there used to be. Perhaps the many great shoals on the Savannah River were just as glorious before they fell silent beneath the waters of the Thurmond, Russell, and Hartwell reservoirs, but I’m not quite old enough to have known any of them. Only the rapids above Augusta, my hometown, still show the beauty of the Savannah before it leaves the Piedmont. But the wildness of the river there is diminished by the new mansions looking down from the bluffs and the dams parceling out the flow from upstream. I think that’s why I love Anthony Shoals so much. This final stretch of the Broad, as it runs through the Broad River Wildlife Management Area, is the only place in the upper Savannah River watershed where the sound of a wild river still rises from such a wide swath of bedrock.”
Juras described the setting at the time of his splendid painting. “On the evening I captured this view, mountain laurel, snowbells, mock orange, Piedmont rhododendron, and fringe tree were in various states of bloom on the steep slopes next to the river. The main show, however, was being staged on the river itself, where one of the few populations of shoals spider lilies left in the Savannah watershed was catching the light of the western horizon with glorious full blooms.”
A Lily—To Be or Not to Be
So, is the rocky shoals spider lily a true lily?
No. These cousins of daffodils grow on similar-sounding rivers, the Catawba and Alabama’s Cahaba. Folks in Alabama call it the Cahaba lily; elsewhere it’s the shoal lily. In Georgia, it’s usually called the shoals spider lily. Most botanists and conservationists call it the “rocky shoals spider lily,” a name arising from its preferred habitat: rivers where fast-flowing, oxygen-rich water runs over rocks, i.e. shoals. This stunning perennial grows three feet high in direct sunlight. Flowing water carries its seeds and bulbs away and when they land in a rocky crevice, a colony forms—if conditions are right. Man’s dams did away with many of the right conditions, i.e. rocky shoals.
Bartram saw, as you can, elegant white flowers arcing over dense greenscapes, their thick clusters festooning rocks. Each plant sends up one to three scapes with as many as six to nine flowers adorning each scape. (The plant’s beauty lures collectors—another reason it’s in danger.)
Doing my best to follow in Bartram’s steps I explore places where a world exists before dams and electricity changed it. When I find rocky shoals spider lilies, I’ve discovered such a place.
You can, too. But mark your calendar for adventure. The flowers are rare and only bloom a short while. It is, indeed, a transient spectacle, so don’t tarry. In late spring, head to Landsford Canal or Stevens Creek. Head to daunting Anthony Shoals, if you dare. You’ll come away with memories of a place artist Philip Juras described as a “watershed where the sound of a wild river still rises from such a wide swath of bedrock.” And you’ll never forget the showy, exquisite rocky shoals spider lilies that truly are botanical royalty.
Preservation Efforts
Learn more about organizations and efforts to preserve these precious blooms.
South Carolina Native Plant Society
South Carolina Conservation Bank Act
Want to Learn More?
Tom Poland visits the rocky shoals spider lilies every year and has shared this bonus post for upgraded subscribers. Be sure to check out his
Substack as well. The Rocky Shoals Highway
Come May–June I burn the Rocky Shoals Highway up. I drive from Irmo, South Carolina to McCormick County and on into Georgia. My mission? Visiting two ravishing colonies of rocky shoals spider lilies. No one is there but me. Seems few know or care to see a true spectacle. Maybe it’s because the lilies lie well off the beaten path.
Hymenocallis coronaria (shoals lily, Cahaba lily) stages quite a show. Around these parts, you can visit three colonies as shoals lilies communities are called. Chester County, South Carolina has the largest known colony at Landsford Canal State Park. Stevens Creek in McCormick County, South Carolina has a grand colony where you can get close enough to smell the flower’s citrusy sweet fragrance. You’ll be tempted to pick a flower. Don’t.
How to Find Them
Behold the world’s largest colony of rocky shoals spider lilies at Landsford Canal State Park. The colony at Stevens Creek on Highway 283 several miles east of Plum Branch, South Carolina, is easy to access. About an hour away off Highway 79 in Lincoln County, Georgia, Anthony Shoals hosts a large colony of lilies. Turn off Highway 79 at Thankful Baptist Church and make your way to Anthony Shoals Road. The long, dirt road leads to a steep bluff with a base that fronts a rocky shoals spider lily spectacle. Study a map. It’s easy to miss the one way into the bluff.
Plan a two-day trek and see all three. Landsford Canal State Park is 2 miles off U.S. 21 at 2051 Park Drive, Catawba, South Carolina. From Anthony Shoals take another way back via Highway 79 to Highway 72 in Elbert County, and take Highway 81 south to Mount Carmel, an 1880s railroad village suspended in time. Book a stay at nearby Hickory Knob State Park and Resort and see the restored historic French Huguenot Guillebeau House and nearby Badwell Cemetery, just off Huguenot Parkway.
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