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Lilium pyrophilum M.W.Skinner & Sorrie
Sandhills Lily
Federal Protection: No US federal protection
State Protection: No Georgia state protection
Global Rank: G2G3
State Rank: S1
Element Locations Tracked in Biotics: Yes
SWAP 2015 Species of Greatest Conservation Need (SGCN): Yes
SWAP 2025 Species of Greatest Conservation Need (SGCN): Yes
2025 SGCN Priority Tier: Highest Conservation Concern
Element Occurrences (EOs) in Georgia: 3
Habitat Summary for element in Georgia: Altamaha grit, open, low woods
Perennial herb rising from a bulb-like rhizome, with smooth, erect stems up to 5.2 feet (1.6 meters) tall, unbranched except in the flower cluster. Leaf whorls are 1 - 12 in number, with 3 - 15 leaves per whorl, clustered near the base of the stem and becoming fewer and more widely spaced up the stem; at the top of the stem are a few, scattered, single leaves angled strongly upwards. Leaves are 1 - 4.8 inches long and 0.3 - 1 inch wide (2.3 - 12.2 cm long and 0.8 - 2.4 cm wide), narrowly elliptic, angled upwards (except near the base), narrowly elliptic with pointed tips and smooth veins and margins; the lower and upper surfaces of the leaves are about the same color and neither surface has a waxy sheen. A branched flower cluster is held at the top of the stem with 1 - 7 flowers nodding at the tips of leaning stalks. Flowers have 3 red or orange sepals and 3 nearly identical petals, fading to yellow with maroon spots toward the base, with a bright green triangle at the very base; sepals and petals are strongly curved upwards, often touching at their tips, like a Turk’s Cap Lily, and fully exposing a single style and 6 spreading stamens; flowers are not fragrant. The style is pale green with a reddish-brown, 3-lobed stigma; the stamens have pale green filaments and rust-colored anthers. Fruit is an oblong, 3-chambered capsule up to 1.8 inches long and 0.75 inch wide (2.8 - 4.7 cm long and 1.5 - 1.9 cm wide), and contains many flat seeds.
Turk’s Cap Lily also occurs in Coastal Plain bogs but is taller (up to 9 feet / 2.8 meters tall) than Sandhill Lily. Its whorls of leaves are distributed more or less evenly along the stem, without the scattered, single leaves at the top of the stem. Turk’s Cap Lily leaves are longer and blunter at the tips, and are either held horizontally or droop at the tips. Turk’s Cap Lily blooms somewhat earlier than Pineland Lily (early July–early August) and its flowers are intensely fragrant.
Michaux’s (or Carolina) Lily (Lilium michauxii) occurs in dry upland forests and woodlands. Its stems rarely if ever exceed 3 feet (1 meter) in height; its leaves are wider above the middle and often occur singly and alternately rather than in whorls; they are noticeably paler on the lower surface than the upper, with a waxy sheen. The flower clusters produce only 1 - 4 flowers; they are strongly fragrant.
Lilium canadense (Canada Lily) occurs in upland woodland edges and limestone glades in northwest Georgia. For more information, see: https://www.georgiabiodiversity.org/portal/profile?group=plants&es_id=18601
Lilium michiganense (Michigan Lily) occurs in remnant wet prairies and calcareous flatwoods in northwest Georgia. For more information, see: https://georgiabiodiversity.org/portal/profile.html?group=plants&es_id=15586&fus_tab_id=1HsRRHkW2qqMS1MunY5KMrvThVR_5C8sAX2-pFapk&group=plant
Lilium philadelphicum (Wood Lily) occurs in wet meadows over sandstone in northwest Georgia. For more information, see: https://georgiabiodiversity.org/portal/profile.html?group=plants&es_id=16274&fus_tab_id=1HsRRHkW2qqMS1MunY5KMrvThVR_5C8sAX2-pFapk&group=plant
In Georgia, Lilium pyrophilum is found in seeps on or near Altamaha Grit outcrops; elsewhere in its range, it occurs in Fall Line sandhills in the wetland transition areas at the base of sandhills and streams.
Although no life history studies have been published for Lilium pyrophilum, it seems likely that it shares life history traits with one of its closest congeners, Turk’s Cap Lily; some of the information in this paragraph is based on that assumption as well as on information in Skinner and Sorrie (2002). Lilium pyrophilum is a perennial herb that reproduces sexually by seed as well as vegetatively by offsets from its rhizomatous bulbs. Its flowers are bisexual and require cross-pollination to set seed. Self-pollination is avoided because the stamens in a given flower mature and produce pollen before the stigma in that flower becomes receptive. Each fruit may contain 100 or more seeds and they require a period of cold before germinating. Seeds germinate in the spring and produce a small bulb by the end of that first summer; the second year after germination, the bulb produces a single leaf; the next year, 2 - 3 leaves are produced; and the third year, a stem with a whorl of leaves is produced. Flowering occurs 3 - 5 years after germination.
Lilium pyrophilum flowers are pollinated by large butterflies, such as swallow-tails, whose wings pick up and deposit pollen as the insect probes for nectar at the base of the pistil; it is also visited by ruby-throated hummingbirds and may also be pollinated by them. Lacking the fragrance of other lilies, Lilium pyrophilum attracts pollinators with brilliant flower color and with the green, contrasting patches of nectary tissue at the very center of the flower. Lilium pyrophilum blooms late July to mid-August. It is known to hybridize with Michaux’s Lily.
Lilies are very attractive to deer, who eat the leaves and stems, and wild hogs, who dig up and eat the bulbs.
Surveys are best conducted during flowering, late July to mid-August, when the plants are most conspicuous. Vegetative plants may be identified by the whorls of leaves concentrated at the base of the stem, by the upwardly angled leaves, and by the presence of a few single, alternate leaves at the top of the stem. Both leaf surfaces are about the same shade of green and are not waxy.
Southeast Georgia, north to Virginia in the Fall Line and Coastal Plain ecoregions.
Widespread loss and degradation of habitat is the most serious threat to Lilium pyrophilum, including conversion of sandhills to pine plantations and other agricultural uses, fire suppression, encroachment by woody plants, and disruption of the seepage hydrology in the sandhills/baygall or pocosin system. Overbrowsing by deer and digging by wild hogs are also a major threat. Lilium pyrophilum may be threatened by the introduced Eurasian Lily Leaf Beetle (Lilioceris lilii) which feeds on Lilium leaves and has been seen in the northeastern U.S. and may be moving southward.
| Threat 1 | Threat 2 | Threat 3 | |
|---|---|---|---|
| General Threat | Natural system modifications | Other options | Pollution |
| Specific Threat | None | None | None |
Lilium pyrophilum is ranked S1 by the Georgia Department of Natural Resources, indicating that it is critically imperiled in the state. Three populations have been discovered in Georgia, only one of these on conservation land.
Protect known sites from development and conversion. Apply prescribed fire every 2 - 3 years in sandhills and allow fire to burn into adjacent wetlands. Limit the size of deer herds. Control wild hog populations. Monitor sites for disturbance and for presence of the Lily Leaf Beetle.
Douglas, N.A., W.A. Wall, Q.-Y Xiang, W.A. Hoffmann, T.R. Wentworth, J.B. Gray, M.G. Hohmann. 2011. Recent vicariance and the origin of the rare, edaphically specialized Sandhills Lily, Lilium pyrophilum (Liliaceae): evidence from phylogenetic and coalescent analyses. Molecular Ecology 20(14): 2901-2915. https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1111/j.1365-294X.2011.05151.x
Drake, J. 2014. Lilies in the wild and in the garden. Breath O' Spring Publications, Inc., Suwannee, Georgia. https://tinyurl.com/wdupfbx
GADNR. 2019. Element occurrence records for Lilium pyrophilum. Georgia Department of Natural Resources, Wildlife Resources Division. Social Circle, Georgia.
Gregory, C., R. Braham, G. Blank, J. Stucky. 2010. Habitat and search criteria of the rare Sandhills Lily, Lilium pyrophilum M. W. Skinner and Sorrie. Castanea 75(2):198-204. https://bioone.org/journals/Castanea/volume-75/issue-2/09-026.1/Habitat-and-Search-Criteria-of-the-Rare-Sandhills-Lily-Lilium/10.2179/09-026.1.full
Hill, S.R. 2007. Conservation assessment for the Turk's-cap Lily (Lilium superbum L.). Technical Report 2007(5). Illinois Natural History Survey and the University of Illinois Division of Biodiversity and Ecological Entomology Biotic Surveys and Monitoring. Champaign, Illinois. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/49176744_Conservation_assessment_for_the_turk's-cap_Lily_Lilium_superbum_L
NatureServe. 2020. Species account for Lilium pyrophilum. NatureServe Explorer. NatureServe, Arlington, Virginia. https://explorer.natureserve.org/Taxon/ELEMENT_GLOBAL.2.161333/Lilium_pyrophilum
Skinner, M.W. 2002. Species account for Lilium pyrophilum. In: Flora of North America North of Mexico, vol. 26. http://beta.floranorthamerica.org/Lilium_pyrophilumAccessed 16 November 2019. http://www.efloras.org/florataxon.aspx?flora_id=1&taxon_id=242101744
Skinner, M.W. and B.A. Sorrie. 2002. Conservation and ecology of Lilium pyrophilum, a new species of Liliaceae from the Sandhills Region of the Carolinas and Virginia, U.S.A. Novon 12(1): 94-105. https://www.jstor.org/stable/3393247?seq=1#metadata_info_tab_contents
Weakley, A.S. 2015. Flora of the southern and mid-Atlantic States. University of North Carolina Herbarium, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill. http://www.herbarium.unc.edu/flora.htm
Linda G. Chafin
Linda G. Chafin, 15 November 2019: original account
