Alabama
PBS crew works to capture Alabama’s Cahaba lilies on film, in moonlight with moths
A film crew working on a documentary for public television has arrived in Birmingham to film day and night in Bibb County, south of Birmingham, hoping to capture a rare water lily as it flowers and is pollinated by moths on the Cahaba River.
Grizzly Creek Films, a production company based in Bozeman, Montana, has a crew in Alabama this week working on a documentary about the Cahaba lilies. The filming is taking place in the Cahaba River National Wildlife Refuge in West Blocton.
The Cahaba lilies, which appear between Mother’s Day and Father’s Day, are in full bloom right now.
“They’re gorgeous this year,” said Beth Stewart, executive director of the Cahaba River Society. “We have the largest stand of Cahaba lilies in the world.”
The picturesque nature-scape of the white lilies in mid-stream has attracted the attention of the filmmakers from Montana.
“They’re making a documentary about the Cahaba lilies right now,” she said. “We’re going to be helping them. They’re going to be doing filming both during the day and at night because they want to try to capture pollination.”
The moon will be full on Thursday, and this week’s moonlight illuminates a hidden drama on the river.
“The lilies are night-pollinated,” Stewart said. “A couple of years ago we did a moonlight canoe trip, the only time we did an official one, because it’s a little scary to be out on those shoals in the dark. You can’t see where the bottom of the river is. You can’t see the rocks.”
What mostly goes unseen is the dance of moths on the moonlit lilies.
“The lilies are made for nighttime pollinations,” Stewart said. “At night, they are just blazing white. They exude this amazing dew that completely dots the inside and outside of the flowers and carries the scent of the lilies on it. The whole shoals just smells fabulous at night. That’s when these sphinx moths and other pollinators, but mainly these moths that are huge and have a really long proboscis, that’s when they come and pollinate. The PBS crew is trying to capture that.”
On Sunday, dozens of people drove their cars down a single-lane dirt road called River Road, at the bridge at Bibb County 24 near West Blocton, parked up against the weeds on the gravel, then waded out into the river to get photos of the large groves of Cahaba lilies growing in the middle of the river.
“That’s the largest Cahaba lily stand on earth,” Stewart said. “They’re called the Cahaba lily or the Shoals spider lily. They’re in South Carolina and Georgia too. We’ve got the most.”
The lilies are very particular about where they grow. They take root in the rocks of the fast-flowing river.
“They won’t grow if they’re not in a river, in running water in that particular habitat,” Stewart said. “People used to try to dig them up, take them home and put them in their garden. They won’t grow. They’ll just die. There’s a different species, called the swamp lily, or the Carolina lily, that looks a lot like the Cahaba lily. That will grow in a garden. It’s made for damp or swampy ground. It’s a different species and sometimes those are available in garden stores. That’s the only one that could work in a garden.”
Cahaba lilies can only grow wild.
“Cahaba lilies, the seeds sink,” she said. “They have to sink and wedge themselves in the crevices of the shoals of the rocks, and then they root. They will not grow unless there’s running water over them.”
They have banner years and less so, sometimes based on how development in the metro area affects stormwater flow into the river.
“The lilies are an indicator of the health of the river,” Stewart said.
“They’re threatened by everything that’s going on in the way that we’ve altered the flow of the river because of all the development in Birmingham metro area because we have so much more storm water runoff, because we have higher floods, more intense floods,” Stewart said. “That carries big chunks of trees that go through the lilies like a bulldozer. There’s also a lot of sediment from all of the extra stormwater flow. The Cahaba River has to get bigger because it’s carrying more rainwater on a regular basis every time it rains. That’s why the banks are collapsing. That’s why we see so much sediment. That’s why the river’s so brown after it rains.”
But right now, the lilies are fabulous. “They are beautiful right now,” Stewart said.
For details and tips on viewing the Cahaba lilies, check out the Cahaba River Society’s website.
The Cahaba lilies are shown in full bloom on Sunday, May 19, 2024. (Photo by Jessica Garrison)Jessica Garrison
Alabama
Top-30 overall recruit Jaxon Richardson commits to Alabama
Jaxon Richardson, the No. 27 overall recruit in the 2026 class per the Rivals Industry Ranking, has committed to Alabama.
The 6-foot-6 four-star small forward out of Southeastern Prep (FL) ultimately chose the Crimson Tide over USC, Creighton, and Ole Miss. He also received offers from Miami, Cincinnati, Michigan, Florida, Villanova, and others.
Richardson, a McDonald’s All-American, becomes the Crimson Tide’s third commitment of the 2026 cycle. He joins four-star shooting guard Qayden Samuels (No. 28 NATL) and four-star small forward Tarris Bouie (No. 54 NATL).
He’s the son of NBA veteran and two-time NBA Dunk Contest champion Jason Richardson. His older brother, Jase, played for Michigan State last season before being selected 25th overall in the 2025 NBA Draft by the Orlando Magic.
More on Richardson
Rivals’ National Recruiting Analyst Jamie Shaw says Richardson is one of the most explosive players in the 2026 class:
Jaxon Richardson is able to combine fluid athleticism with explosive burst in a way no other player in this class can. He uses his athleticism to his advantage on the floor. He fills the outside channels with a purpose in transition, he is aggressive in the passing lanes, and he plays as a vertical floor spacer in the dunker spots and lob plays. Last summer, playing with the Florida Rebels on Nike’s EYBL Circuit, the 6-foot-6 wing averaged 12.8 points on 54.0 percent shooting and 10.5 attempts per game. Last high school season, he averaged 12.9 points on 61.0 percent shooting on 8.9 attempts per game. He is a highly efficient player, as 84.4 percent of his makes last high school season were at the rim.
Alabama
Alabama Baseball Ties Stolen Base Record In Win Over Hornets
Alabama baseball cruised to a win over Alabama State on Wednesday night, beating the Hornets 13-4 to complete the season sweep. The Crimson Tide tied a program record with nine stolen bases in one of the stranger contests that will be played this season.
The tone was set for a tumultuous night on the basepaths in the opening minutes of the game. Leadoff batter Bryce Fowler, who exited Tuesday’s game after getting beaned in the head, was walked, and promptly took second base. He advanced to third on a wild pitch in Justin Lebron’s at-bat, paving the way for Lebron to steal second when he was ultimately walked as well.
The successful baserunning instantly paid off, as Brady Neal drove both in with a double to left-center field before John Lemm walked two at-bats later. Both runners stole their respective bases on the same pitch in Jason Torres’ plate appearance, meaning that four of the first five batters of the game stole a base.
Alabama has been exceptional on the basepaths, sitting at 30-for-30 on the season. Lebron, who swiped two bags on Wednesday, leads the team with 12. The junior had an up-and-down night, hitting his eighth home run of the season, but also committing an error at shortstop for the fourth consecutive game.
“Get those things out of there now, baby. The dude is unbelievable,” an unconcerned Rob Vaughn said on Tuesday of Lebron’s errors. “We’re going to look up at the end of the year, and that guy is going to have five or six errors, which one he’s got right now, and we’ll be like, ‘Man, that guy is the best of all time to do it.’”
Wednesday’s game was a very prototypical midweek contest with no shortage of quirks and oddities throughout its nearly four-hour runtime. Fifteen Alabama batters were walked, falling just one shy of the program record, and the hit by pitch record was tied as seven batters were plunked.
The game was never competitive from an on-field standpoint. After barely escaping with a 2-1 win in the first matchup with the Hornets two weeks ago, this was a far more accurate representation of what these games typically look like, as Alabama now leads the all-time series 15-0.
Freshman Joe Chiarodo made his first career start, allowing two hits and one walk over two scoreless innings. He was named the winning pitcher. Luke Smyers, Connor Lehman, Anthony Pesci and Tate Robertson were the other pitchers to take the mound. Lehman allowed a three-run blast in the sixth inning, and those were the only runs until the incredibly-named Skywalker Mann drove in a run off Robertson in the ninth.
Perhaps the most shocking figure from the game was that Alabama had 19 runners left on base. The Crimson Tide left the bases loaded in four different innings. As stated, this was just a bizarre baseball game across the board. With the midweeks out of the way, the Crimson Tide gets to prepare for its final weekend tune-up before SEC play as North Florida heads into Tuscaloosa on Friday.
Alabama
New Alabama law to set screen time limits for kids in day care, pre-K and kindergarten
The Healthy Early Development and Screen Time Act was signed on Wednesday, March 4, by Governor Kay Ivey to introduce limits on children’s screen time access in Alabama.
The Act is one of Ivey’s 2026 legislative priorities.
“Video screen access in classrooms can boost learning skills among our young children, but too much screen exposure can also be detrimental, harming critical social and cognitive development,” Ivey said. “The Healthy Early Development and Screen Time Act ensures our youngest students are provided a healthy balance of screen time and traditional learning in order to protect social and emotional development.”
Under the Healthy Early Development and Screen Time Act, the Alabama Department of Early Childhood Education will be required to work with the Department of Human Resources and the State Department of Education to develop guidelines for screen-based media.
Guidelines will be implemented in early childhood education programs like day care centers, day care homes, night care facilities, pre-kindergarten, kindergarten and group day care homes. The Act was sponsored by Representative Jeana Ross and Senator Donnie Chesteen.
“House Bill 78 establishes clear, research-based expectations for how technology is used in early childhood settings,” said Ross. “The goal is not to eliminate technology, but to ensure its use is developmentally appropriate and never replaces the hands-on learning and human interaction young children need most. By setting thoughtful guardrails and aligning classroom practices with the best available research on early brain development, this legislation supports educators, protects the quality of early learning and reinforces our commitment to giving Alabama’s youngest students the strongest possible start.”
A training program will also be created by the Department of Early Childhood Education to create a baseline for the appropriate use of child screentime for teachers and staff members supervising children.
“The Healthy Early Development and Screen Time Act represents another important step in ensuring Alabama’s youngest children grow and learn in environments that prioritize human interaction, exploration and healthy development,” said Chesteen. “Building on the progress made with last year’s FOCUS Act, this legislation continues our commitment to protecting the most formative years of childhood. I am grateful to Governor Kay Ivey and my colleagues in the Legislature for recognizing the importance of this issue and working together to support Alabama families.”
The Healthy Early Development and Screen Time Act will become effective on January 1, 2027.
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