Dude, where are my naked ladies?

September always surprises me with its unexpected blooms. The oxblood lilies (Rhodophiala bifida), for example. I tend to forget about their existence throughout at least ten months of the year. But then August breathes its last, the calendar leaf turns over to September, and one day I look up and there they are! Blooming their little hearts out.

The oxbloods have continued to bloom profusely throughout the month, but as I was gazing at them earlier this week, it occurred to me that there was something that I was missing. Something I had forgotten in my life or in my garden.

Then, suddenly, it hit me. Where are my naked ladies?

I rushed to the bed where the Lycoris radiata live. You may call them "surprise lilies," "red spider lilies," "resurrection lilies," or even "hurricane lilies," but for me they will always be "naked ladies." That was the evocative name by which I first learned about them and it's the one that sticks with me.

  Some of my naked ladies photographed in September, 2012.

These members of the amaryllis family, native to China, send their bloom stalks up before the leaves develop, thus they are naked. Here, those blooms normally appear as if by magic in early September, often in response to heavy rains. 

Well, we haven't had too many heavy rains this year, but then we didn't have a whole lot of rain last year either but my naked ladies bloomed beautifully. This year, not so much. Not a peep from them, not a single blossom.

This is not the first year that I've had a naked lady failure. In fact, in recent years, failure has been more the norm. I was a bit surprised when they bloomed so prolifically last year. But that spoiled me and I was hoping for a repeat performance this year. Here we are almost at the end of September, though, and I have to concede that it probably just isn't going to happen.

Oh, well, just like with the Astros, it'll be "wait'll next year and hope."