Species
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Hymenocallis littoralis (Jacq.) Salisb.

Beach Spider Lily, Beach Spiderlily, Chirungu masera bole, Sari chirungu masera bole, Dongolo lolo be, Sari dongolo maland be

Climate known 68 photographs Bulb, tuber or caudex
Add one to my plants Sow seed

Every figure on this page is derived from public data by a stated rule and says its source; nothing here is written by a person or a model, except the Wikipedia passage, which is quoted and marked as such. How it is made.

Summary

Hymenocallis littoralis, commonly known as the beach spider lily or lirio de playa, is a species of plant in the amaryllis family Amaryllidaceae. It is native to warmer coastal regions of Latin America and a widely cultivated and naturalized plant in many tropical countries.

Text from Wikipedia, “Hymenocallis littoralis”, CC BY-SA 4.0, quoted as written. Kept separate from everything derived here.

About the genus · Hymenocallis

Hymenocallis (US) or (UK) is a genus of flowering plants in the Amaryllidaceae family native to the Americas.

Text from Wikipedia, “Hymenocallis”, CC BY-SA 4.0, quoted as written.

Family
Amaryllidaceae
Described by
(Jacq.) Salisb.
Native to
Mexico Central, Mexico Northeast, Mexico Gulf +13
Wild records
954 in range· 445 open

At a glance

Warmest month
30°C
Apr, mean day; nights 23 °C (CHELSA)
Rain
1421mm/yr
12 wet months · peak Sep 221 mm (CHELSA)
Light
26–41DLI
mol/m²/day, winter to summer, open sky (CHELSA shortwave)
In short condensed by rule from the cultivation cards · not written by a person
Grouped as a bulb, tuber or caudex by Amaryllidaceae, which is usually but not always one kind of plant (archetype table). Rain rule: a sharp rainy season, June to October at the habitat (not shifted); the temperature curve is flat (3.9 °C of range), so no growing season is inferred. Habitat rain 1421 mm a year, wettest September at 221 mm, driest March at 33 mm (habitat calendar, northern hemisphere). Open sky over the habitat: 26 to 41 mol/m²/day. Cold floor 14.8 °C (1st-percentile habitat night, NASA POWER).
Each sentence is one card's own one-line form, written by the same rule as the card (Its year, Rain, Light, Temperature); the note cannot say what a card does not. Months are given for the northern hemisphere (set your site in Settings to change this), and the habitat's own alongside. The cards · the figures.

Also known as Hymenocallis adnata Herb.; Hymenocallis adnata var. disticha (Sims) Herb.; Hymenocallis adnata var. driandrina Herb.; Hymenocallis adnata var. dryanderi (Ker Gawl.) Kunth; Hymenocallis adnata var. dryandri (Ker Gawl.) Kunth and 45 more.

Cultivation

Grouped as a bulb, tuber or caudex by Amaryllidaceae, which is usually but not always one kind of plant (archetype table). The table holds no figure for this group, which spans too much for one minimum; the cold floor is the habitat's alone, and no prose comes from the table.

Its year Rain rule: a sharp rainy season, June to October at the habitat (not shifted); the temperature curve is flat (3.9 °C of range), so no growing season is inferred.

This species’ habitat figures, and what two fixed rules read from them.

The rain rule reads a sharp season: 70% of the year's rain (1006 mm of 1421 mm) falls in June to October. The temperature curve is flat, 3.9 °C between the warmest and coldest month, so the growing-season rule does not infer a growing season from it. Months are the habitat's, northern hemisphere; with a flat temperature curve there is no season to reverse, so they are not shifted for a collection elsewhere.

Read from the median year of CHELSA monthly rainfall and mean temperature across the envelope cells: the rain rule takes the smallest set of months carrying 70% of the rain and calls it winter when its mean is more than half a degree below the year's, summer when more than that above, and neither in between; the temperature rule, used only under 120 mm, names the cooler six months when they are at least a degree cooler than the other six. Months are shifted for the other hemisphere only where the temperature curve gives a season to reverse. A reading of the curves, not an observation of the plant.

Rain Habitat rain 1421 mm a year, wettest September at 221 mm, driest March at 33 mm (habitat calendar, northern hemisphere).

This species’ habitat figures, with their source.

1421 mm a year at the habitat, 1006 mm of it June to October. Wettest month September at 221 mm, driest March at 33 mm. Across the envelope cells the year's total runs 807 mm to 3071 mm (10th to 90th percentile of each cell's own year) (median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA; habitat calendar, northern hemisphere).

CHELSA monthly precipitation, median year across the envelope cells. The rain that falls where the species is recorded; nothing about how the plant takes water.

Light Open sky over the habitat: 26 to 41 mol/m²/day.

This species’ habitat figures, with their source.

Open sky over the habitat: 26 to 41 mol/m²/day across the year (daily light integral, median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA; the lowest 10th-percentile month across the cells is 23, the highest 90th-percentile month 47).

CHELSA shortwave radiation at each envelope cell, a daily-mean flux taken to a daily total and converted at 2.07 mol of PAR per MJ. The sky over the habitat, measured; what reaches a plant under a rock, a shrub or a shade cloth is not.

Warmth and air Cold floor 14.8 °C (1st-percentile habitat night, NASA POWER).

This species’ habitat figures, with their source.

Temperature

Coldest: the 1st-percentile night over 44 years at the typical cell is 14.8 °C, the absolute minimum 9.3 °C, no frost in 44 years (NASA POWER daily minima). Warmest: the 99th-percentile day is 38.6 °C. Monthly means: coldest night 20.0 °C in January (across the envelope cells 10.4 °C to 23.9 °C), warmest day 29.6 °C in April (median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA). Cold floor: 14.8 °C, which is the 1st-percentile night over 44 years at the typical cell (NASA POWER).

NASA POWER daily minima and maxima 1981–2024 at the typical cell, lapse-corrected to its elevation; CHELSA monthly means, median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA. The cold floor is the figure named in its sentence. Not a measured survival limit for any plant in a pot.

Humidity

Relative humidity at the habitat: 60 to 66% across the year (monthly means, median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA). A figure about the air, saying nothing about how the plant takes water.

CHELSA relative humidity, median year across the envelope cells.

The figures the cards read from are in Climate below, and where they came from in Natural habitat.

Climate across the habitat

Habitat climate through the yearMean day from 26 °C in Jan to 30 °C in Apr; mean night from 20 °C in Jan to 24 °C in Jun. The cold quarter, Dec to Feb, is the three months around the coldest night. 1421 mm of rain a year, most in Sep. The bands show the 10th to 90th percentile across 647 habitat cells. Over 44 years at the typical cell the absolute minimum was 9.3 °C and the 99th-percentile day 38.6 °C; neither is dated to a month. Beneath: daily light integral and relative humidity through the year, each on its own scale.10°15°20°25°30°35°40°38.6° 99th-percentile day (undated)9.3° lowest night in 44 yrs (undated)°C · day and nightcold quarter0100200300400500mm rainDLI 26–41RH 60–66 %JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
day night rain 10th–90th percentile across 647 habitat cells cold quarter: the three months around the coldest night extremes over 44 years at the typical cell, marked at the edge: undated DLI, mol/m²/dayRH %each on its own scale
Figures by month
JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
Day °C26 / 23–2927 / 24–3128 / 26–3230 / 26–3430 / 26–3429 / 24–3329 / 24–3229 / 24–3229 / 24–3128 / 24–3027 / 24–2926 / 23–29
Night °C20 / 10–2421 / 11–2422 / 12–2523 / 14–2524 / 15–2624 / 16–2624 / 15–2624 / 15–2624 / 16–2623 / 15–2522 / 13–2521 / 11–24
Rain mm46 / 10–19135 / 8–14033 / 5–12640 / 5–168100 / 21–313197 / 87–358191 / 104–385204 / 110–379221 / 127–402193 / 67–372100 / 17–33461 / 9–222
DLI28 / 24–3533 / 29–3938 / 35–4441 / 35–4740 / 30–4737 / 28–4137 / 28–4136 / 30–4033 / 30–3630 / 27–3428 / 25–3326 / 23–33
RH %61 / 53–6660 / 52–6560 / 50–6560 / 49–6663 / 53–6865 / 59–7065 / 61–7065 / 61–7066 / 63–7165 / 61–7063 / 57–6962 / 54–68

Each figure is the median across the 647 grid cells holding the 922 in-range records, with the 10th–90th percentile span across those cells after the slash where it differs. Extremes and elevation were read at the typical cell 1431:1829 (18.425, -88.525). Over 44 years there: absolute minimum 9.3 °C, 1st-percentile night 14.8 °C, 99th-percentile day 38.6 °C. Normals: CHELSA V2.1 1981–2010 climatology, 0.05° cells (each the mean of ~36 1 km pixels). Envelope: median and 10th–90th percentile of each month across the 647 distinct grid cells holding the 922 in-range records; extremes and elevation at the typical cell 1431:1829 (its coldest month's mean night nearest the median across cells); its position is the cell centre. Extremes: NASA POWER (MERRA-2) daily 1981–2024, cell 18.50_-88.750, lapse-corrected -59 m at 6.5 °C/km. Elevation: ETOPO 2022, 14 m (cell mean).

Natural habitat

Native range as published by WCVP; the marker is where the records are densest and decides nothing: the climate was read across every in-range record's cell, not at the marker.
Openly licensed records inside the range, framed on where they fall.
NativeMexico Central, Mexico Northeast, Mexico Gulf, Mexico Southwest, Mexico Southeast, Belize, Costa Rica, Honduras, Nicaragua, Panama, Venezuela, Colombia, Peru, Brazil West-Central, Brazil Northeast, Brazil Southeast· introduced: Tunisia, Cape Verde, Gambia, The, Guinea-Bissau, Guinea, Central African Republic, Equatorial Guinea, Gulf of Guinea Is., Zaïre, Angola, Zambia, Chagos Archipelago, Comoros, Mauritius, Seychelles, Ogasawara-shoto, Bangladesh, India, Sri Lanka, Jawa, Philippines, Bismarck Archipelago, Fiji, Gilbert Is., Nauru, Niue, Samoa, Tonga, Cook Is., Line Is., Marquesas, Society Is., Caroline Is., Marianas, Marshall Is., Wake I., Hawaii, French Guiana, Surinam, Ecuador
Kew's description“bulbous geophyte” · “wet tropical”· quoted from WCVP, RBG Kew (CC BY 4.0); not derived here
Map marker20.668, -87.029 · in the densest population, 369 records (39% of those in range)
Evidence usedThe map marker and the climate envelope rest on all 954 georeferenced records inside the native range; the map shows only the 445 openly licensed ones, which alone would put the marker 84 km away. 788 records outside the range (gardens, roadsides, misidentifications) ignored. 32 in-range records are placed to worse than 10 km and stay on the map but off the climate.
The map markerthe map marker: the openly licensed record nearest the middle of the densest 1° population inside the densest 2° block of the 954 in-range records; it decides nothing.

Photographs

Hymenocallis littoralisHymenocallis littoralisHymenocallis littoralisHymenocallis littoralisHymenocallis littoralisHymenocallis littoralisHymenocallis littoralisHymenocallis littoralis

Photographs: (c) Ricard Busquets Reverte, some rights reserved (CC BY) (4); (c) Caleb Catto, some rights reserved (CC BY) (3); (c) Frank Dietze, some rights reserved (CC BY).

Photographs: iNaturalist did not answer when this page was built; what is shown came from the sources that did.

Papers naming this species

Works whose title or abstract names Hymenocallis littoralis, most cited first, from OpenAlex (CC0). A mention, not a cultivation source: nothing on this page is drawn from them.

Antineoplastic Agents, 256. Cell Growth Inhibitory Isocarbostyrils from Hymenocallis
George R. Pettit, George R. Pettit, Ralph A. Backhaus, M. R. Boyd (1993) · Journal of Natural Products
Fungal Planet description sheets: 92–106
P.W. Crous, Brett A. Summerell, Roger G. Shivas, Megan K. Romberg (2011) · Persoonia - Molecular Phylogeny and Evolution of Fungi
Lycorine alkaloids from Hymenocallis littoralis
Long-Ze Lin, Shufang Hu, Heebyung Chai, Thitima Pengsuparp (1995) · Phytochemistry
Isolation and Structural Modification of 7-Deoxynarciclasine and 7-Deoxy-trans-Dihydronarciclasine,1
George R. Pettit, S.A. Eastham, Noeleen Melody, Brian Orr (2005) · Journal of Natural Products
Antineoplastic Agents. 553. The Texas Grasshopper Brachystola magna
George R. Pettit, Yanhui Meng, Delbert L. Herald, John Knight (2005) · Journal of Natural Products
Biofilm inhibition mechanism from extract of Hymenocallis littoralis leaves
Naiem H. Nadaf, Rishikesh S. Parulekar, Rahul Patil, Trupti K. Gade (2018) · Journal of Ethnopharmacology
Antineoplastic Agents, 294. Variations in the Formation of Pancratistatin and Related Isocarbostyrils in Hymenocallis littoralis
George R. Pettit, George R. Pettit, Ralph A. Backhaus, Fred E. Boettner (1995) · Journal of Natural Products
Pancratistatin induces apoptosis in clinical leukemia samples with minimal effect on non-cancerous peripheral blood mononuclear cells
Carly Griffin, Caroline Hamm, James McNulty, Siyaram Pandey (2010) · Cancer Cell International
The effect of cytokinins on in vitro shoot length and multiplication of Hymenocallis littoralis
Kian Yew Chai, Bhavani Balakrishnan, Jeev, Sundasekaran ran (2010) · Journal of Medicinal Plants Research

Similar habitat climate the 6 species whose habitat climate is nearest this one's: mean day and night, month by month, and rain on a log scale, in calendar order, so a habitat with the same seasons six months out is far, not near. Nothing else counts: not range, not family.

Other Hymenocallis 1 in the reference

History & registers

Where this page came from built 2026-09-20 · dossier v2 · node
gbif.species answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-19 (offline re-derivation; the backbone was not asked)
gbif.synonyms answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-19 (offline re-derivation; the backbone was not asked)
gbif.vernacular answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-19 (offline re-derivation; the backbone was not asked)
wcvp.distribution answered
gbif.occurrences answeredGBIF occurrence download https://doi.org/10.15468/dl.3h4zam
climate answered
wikidata answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive); that build: carried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive)
wikipedia answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-19; this build: skipped
inat.taxon not asked
inat.photos.wild answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-19; this build: skipped
inat.photos.cultivated nothing to reportcarried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive); that build: carried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive)
commons nothing to reportcarried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive); that build: carried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive)
gbif.media answered
openalex answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-19; this build: skipped

Every upstream is recorded as having answered, reported nothing, or refused. Only “nothing to report” is ever shown as an absence. Records came from 97 datasets via GBIF.org; each carries its own licence.