Higanbana, hurricane lily or cluster licorice blooms a lot throughout Takashima City in October. The bright red flowers are as beautiful as Japanese fireworks. This flower is a perennial plant that grows on bulbs. In Japan, it grows in clusters on roadsides and rice fields all over the country. Since Takashima has many rice fields, this flower, which prefers water and wetlands such as rice field ridges, is in bloom everywhere.
This flower blooms around the equinoctial week in autumn. In Japanese, the equinoctial week is called "Higan", so this flower has come to be called "Higanbana".
When you get off at Omi-Nakasho Station in Takashima, there is a beach called Katsurahama nearby. This beach is famous as a natural cluster licorices' spot and is visited by flower lovers in the fall.
According to one legend, those who pluck this flower unnecessarily will have a fire in their house. Moreover, some people believe that cluster licorice represents the fragility of human life, like a sparkler that Japanese people enjoy during the summer but burns out quickly and falls off, because the equinoctial week is the season for Japanese people to visit their families' graves. By remembering your deceased family, the beauty of this flower stands out even more.
To tell the truth, this plant contains a toxin called alkaloid. Therefore, planting them on the ridges of rice fields has the effect of warding off moles, the enemy of rice cultivation: when the mole digs a hole in the ridge of the rice field, the water in the rice field could flow out.
Katsurahama is an 18-minute walk from Omi-Nakasho Station.
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