Bridge to Hell: Red Spider Lily

by Xinyuan (Kara) Lyu

I have heard many stories about the red spider lily from movies, books, and the internet. The most impressive story, however, was one I heard from my mother. In my mother’s story, a devil fell in love with a human girl. The devil’s love was unrequited because the girl did not like the devil at all because he had a fearful look. Therefore, the devil imprisoned the girl and expected one day she would feel touched by the devil’s love and change her mind. One day, a soldier passed by the devil’s place. The soldier rescued the girl from the prison and killed the devil. When the devil died he returned to hell, but his blood spattered on the Earth. Unrequited love hurt the most, and after the devil’s death, this scarlet red spider lily grew from the spot where he died. This spot became the bridge to hell, connecting the hell and the Earth. 

I never thought that I would see a red spider lily with my own eyes. On the day I went back home worship my grandparents in Ningbo, a town in southern China, I saw a red spider lily for the first time. When my family and I entered the cemetery, I noticed a large patch of red flowers growing near the tomb. Even though I had seen pictures of the flower on the internet, I was shocked by its beauty. The color was so dazzling that it was almost impossible for me to ignore it, but none of the elders around me were interested in the flower. I tried to walk closer to look at the lily, but my uncle stopped me and told me to stay away because these flowers would bring me misfortune.  

Even though I had seen pictures of the flower on the internet, I was shocked by its beauty. The color was so dazzling that it was almost impossible for me to ignore it.

Although I knew many myths about the red spider lily, I was still confused about people’s strange attitudes toward it. I wanted to learn more about this plant. Red spider lily (Lycoris radiata) is also known as manjusaka, and is native to China, Korea, and Nepal. It has been introduced to Japan, the United States, and other places around the world. It is called red spider lily because each flower has significantly reflexed and long petals that look like spider legs. The red spider lily also has strap-like grayish-green leaves, but you cannot see leaves together with flowers, because the leaves only appear after the bloom is finished. Wild red spider lily typically grows in acidic soils and prefers shady and moist environments that are rich in organic matter, which provides the necessary nutrients and minerals for it to grow. This habitat preference explains why people usually find a vast mass of red spider lily at the side of tombs, and explains why people usually associate red spider lilies and hell together. 

Most stories depict red spider lily as a representation of an evil world. People say it only brings disasters, however, red spider lily is also sometimes used for medical treatments. Its roots are used to treat swellings, ulcers, and the nervous afflictions of children. The bulb is used to counteract poisons and can be made into a plaster to treat burns and scalds. Additionally, Red spider flower contains alkaloids that are associated with anticancer, antibacterial, and antiretroviral properties. 

I became very disappointed after I found out that some people in my hometown were burning and cutting out red spider lilies. People only believed in the evil sides of red spider lily from fictional stories, but ignored its benefits in the real world. The intentional destruction of red spider lilies led to its disappearance in many wild areas near my hometown, and I hardly ever saw any red spider lilies  I realized that human beings are not the only victims of stereotypes and prejudices. Plants like the red spider lily also suffer from it. I know it is difficult to change people’s beliefs, but I hope you will have a different opinion about it after reading my plant love story.

Xinyuan is a 21 years old student currently studying biology at University of Pittsburgh. She comes from Beijing, China and currently live in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

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Photo Credits: (Top) Jim Evans Wikimedia Commons [CC BY-SA (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0)]; (Bottom): おぉたむすねィく探検隊. 彼岸花と蝶. Wikipedia Commons

Here a Birch Tree, There a Mountain Ash

By Luba Markovskaia

Over the past decade, I’ve become increasingly enthralled with the plant world. In my early twenties, gently egged on by my then-partner who was an avid botanist with a biology degree, I learned to recognize most trees and many understory forest plants found in Quebec and eastern Canada. My partner taught me to carry field guides when I go on a hike (though I still leave them at home too often, and consistently regret it).

That is how I learned to look closely at my surroundings and to notice the subtle differences that make any environment richer and turn any walk—in nature or in the city streets—into “a field trip, a series of happy recognitions,” as Annie Dillard so beautifully put it.

My naturalistic impulses are heightened during this period of uncertainty and self-isolation, though they are mostly restrained to my backyard, at least in the material world.

On social media, in an effort to “cleanse my timeline” from constant anxiety-inducing reports and statistics, I began following other passionate botanists, finding kindred spirits in these joyful and generous wells of knowledge. As I scroll past a video of the US president’s latest meltdown, a tutorial for a homemade mask, and a graph showing a decidedly unflattened curve (as I write this, my city, Montreal, is the Canadian epicentre of the pandemic, with no signs of letting up), the sight of the delicately sloped bud of a nascent trillium flower helps me breathe deeper.

Normally during this time of year, I would be strolling across the woods of Mount Royal—the hilly park that we Montrealers proudly call ‘The Mountain’—and marveling at the trillium carpeting the forest floor in a glimmering expanse of white. Though it is now best to avoid such crowded spaces, I am heartened still by these momentous digital dispatches from the plant world. My mother has also taken to sending me pictures of blooms she encounters on her walks around the leafy neighbourhood where I spent part of my childhood and adolescence, after we moved away from our Russian-Jewish enclave in the largely immigrant part of town where we first settled. She regales me with photos of magnolias, rhododendrons, and Siberian squill. One morning, she sent me a flowering birch tree along with a lyrical poem about spring awakenings by Sergey Yesenin.

It occurred to me then that the seeds of my passion for plants and trees, along with my love of literature and poetry, were planted in me earlier than I tend to think.

I was five years old when we emigrated from St. Petersburg to Montreal, a mere two years after the fall of the Soviet Union. My mother embarked on a new career, learning a programming language along with the two official languages (French and English) of our new country. A generous Polish colleague of hers lent us a small cottage in Rawdon in the summer. Rawdon is an unremarkable rural town, similar to most French-Canadian areas in the region, save for the fact that it carries traces of Eastern Europe—an Orthodox church and cemetery—as many Russian, Ukrainian, and Belorussian nobles settled in its countryside after the 1917 Russian Revolution.

In Rawdon, my summers were structured by my grandmother’s strict daily programme, reminiscent of Soviet pioneer camps: warm-up exercises in the morning, Russian grammar and history classes before lunch followed by a swim in the lake, an afternoon stroll during which we recited verses by Pushkin or Lermontov, and a Soviet film in the evening.

As we walked on the side of the road along dense pine groves, we would encounter numerous red “Private” signs nailed to the trunks of trees. “Privaht! Privaht!” my Communist babulya would throw up her arms. "How can the forest be Privaht!?"

My mother, my sister, my nephew, and I still head to Rawdon every year. While my family flocks to the crowded beach overrun with barbecuing Russians in the summer (which I tend to avoid), I gladly join their mushroom-picking visits in the fall. If all the best varieties are gone by the time we arrive, we sigh with a mix of resignation and reverence for the Polish mushroom-foragers that presumably got there before us. Mushroom-picking is relatively rare among most Quebeckers, who feel the activity is surrounded by a deadly aura. So, mushroom picking in Rawdon is still very much the purview of more recent immigrants from Eastern Europe like us. I follow my mother down forest paths as she expertly spots edible varieties and, when in doubt, tastes a tiny nibble to check for bitter taste. Somewhere between North American caution and Russian brazenness, I trust her instincts, but would rather carry a field guide—and triple check my findings online—when left to my own devices.

I sometimes think how lucky it is that my nature-loving mother and grandmother emigrated to a faraway country with such a similar climate to their homeland. While they struggled to navigate new languages and conventions, they were almost immediately at home in this natural environment, with its rough winters and familiar flora. We used to sing a patriotic tune from the Soviet era called “Our Land” on our countryside walks with my late babulya. The lyrics translate to something like

“Here a birch tree, there a mountain ash /

a willow branch above the river /

my ever-beloved homeland /

Where can one find another such place?”

I’m glad to know that, though my uprooted mother may still struggle at times to adapt to the particulars of the foreign soil, she can look up and see a birch tree or a mountain ash, remember a few lines of poetry, and feel at home.

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Luba is a freelance translator and editor living and working in Montreal. She holds a Ph.D. in French literature and occasionally publishes essays, book reviews, and literary translations. You can follow Luba on twitter @luba_mark

Overlook's Red Pines

by Rachel Boyea

Ever since I was seven years old, I have spent my summers at 4-H Camp Overlook. Camp is way up in the Adirondack mountains in New York State, in a small town close to where I grew up. Some of my happiest memories occurred at Camp Overlook and I have made lifelong friends at the camp. 

When you first enter camp, the first thing you notice is the dirt path, lined with tall, skinny, red pines. The deeper in you go, the more red pines you notice. They absolutely adorn the place. For me, such a large portion of my memories are associated with the pines, and when I see them I feel beyond nostalgic. 

One memory that sticks out in particular was when I was around thirteen years old. I was suited up in my blue harness, on belay, and ready to start climbing. I stepped up on the ladder and made my way to a very tiny U-shaped metal bars jammed into the tree. From that point on, I had to climb those little metal bars all the way to the very top of the tree. At about  halfway up, I realized the tree was bending and swaying in the wind. My mouth had gone completely dry. I felt like I had been climbing for hours. The metal pegs were so small, I was afraid I would miss my footing, and fall the 70 feet I had worked so hard to ascend. Eventually, I made it to the 2x3 wooden platform near the very top of the tree. I removed my carabiner from the belay and I hooked onto a zip line. I had to jump. My feet inched forward and I threw myself off the platform, fighting against all natural instincts. I free-fell for a good 10 feet before the zip wire had enough tension to catch me. Once my momentum came to an end at the bottom of the zipline, a ladder appeared so I could get down and so the next person could go. Soon after I got off the tree, I started crying because I was so startled from the experience. 

Although stressful at the time, I laugh about this experience now. Now I am a counselor at Camp Overlook, and I am the one who teaches kids how to climb the trees and watches them zip for the first time. Once every summer comes to an end, I drive out the path lined with red pines, past the red gates, and onto the pavement, knowing that next summer I get to do it all over again.

Rachel is 18 years old and a student at Chatham University in Pittsburgh, PA.

Photo credit: 4-H Camp Overlook Archive