Nerine(Nerine bowdenii)

Dear Readers, I have a special affection for plant that bloom in the autumn, when  everything else is closing down, and this Nerine, otherwise known as the Cornish Lily, Cape Flower, Guernsey Lily or Bowden’s Lily, is a truly spectacular plant. Although it looks like a lily, it’s actually much more closely related to the Amaryllis. As pointed out in a previous post, it comes from South Africa, as do the other 20-30 species (scientists don’t seem to be able to come to a consensus on the number), so Cape Flower is probably the most accurate vernacular name.

Nerines are named for the Nereids, sea-going female spirits who rescued drowning sailors – there was a story that the plant first arrived in Guernsey after being washed ashore from a shipwreck. This particular species (Nerine bowdenii) was named after Athelstan Cornish-Bowden, surveyor-general in South Africa in the early 1900s, who first sent the bulbs (apparently shaped like ‘old-fashioned Chianti bottles’) to the UK in 1904.

Nerines are apparently fairly hardy (down to -15 degrees Celsius), grow best when crowded and hate being disturbed. It doesn’t like tropical or humid conditions, but does like heat. It sounds like a bit of a handful to be perfectly honest, but clearly the ones that I saw here on the County Roads in East Finchley were very happy. The owner of this house also has great success with Agapanthus, another South African bulbous plant, so clearly they have skills! I am very impressed.

Nerine bulbs contain a chemical called ungeremine, which is being investigated as a possible medicine for Alzheimer’s Disease, and as a bactericide. It also seems to have potential in the treatment of malaria and sleeping sickness.

In the wild, Nerine bowdenii is a plant of mountainous terrain with heavy summer rains and cold winter temperatures – note that any rain runs away, hence this plant’s hatred of having ‘wet feet’. It is pollinated by the long-tongued fly Prosoeca ganglbaueri, which has a tongue long enough to get to the nectar at the base of a nerine flower. What an astonishing creature – its tongue is actually longer than its body. And let’s not forget how important flies are in pollination – we all love the bees, with their furry bodies and (usually) cheerful dispositions, but let’s give credit where it’s due to our other buzzy insect neighbours.

Proseoeca ganglbaueri – look at the length of that tongue! Photo by Harroi de Moor at https://pollinationresearch.wordpress.com/2017/06/

I was surprised that I couldn’t find a poem on nerines, or Guernsey Lilies, or Cornish Lilies, so in the end, I searched for the colour pink, and came up with this, by Siegfried Sassoon. I have read a lot of Sassoon’s poetry, but this one was new to me. ‘In the pink’ means ‘being in good health, having reasons to be optimistic’. Plenty of irony here. See what you think.

‘In The Pink’ by Siegfried Sassoon

So Davies wrote: ‘ This leaves me in the pink. ‘
Then scrawled his name: ‘ Your loving sweetheart Willie ‘
With crosses for a hug. He’d had a drink
Of rum and tea; and, though the barn was chilly,
For once his blood ram warm; he had pay to spend,
Winter was passing; soon the year would mend.

He couldn’t sleep that night. Stiff in the dark
He groaned and thought of Sundays at the farm,
When he’d go out as cheerful as a lark
In his best suit to wander arm-in-arm
With brown-eyed Gwen, and whisper in her ear
The simple, silly things she liked to hear.

And then he thought: to-morrow night we trudge
Up to the trenches, and my boots are rotten.
Five miles of stodgy clay and freezing sludge,
And everything but wretchedness forgotten.
To-night he’s in the pink; but soon he’ll die.
And still the war goes on; he don’t know why.