A man’s Instagram photos help scientists find a new giant water lily

Its leaves are so wide that you can see them in satellite pictures, but the plant had no scientific name until an American man posted photos of himself swimming next to it in a river in Colombia. On 9 October 2026, scientists who study plants said it was a new species, Victoria colombiana, the Colombian giant water lily. They think only 30 to 50 plants may still grow in the wild.

The man in the photos is Jeremiah Harris, who runs a plant business in Colorado Springs, in the United States. He posted the photos after a visit to the Inírida region of eastern Colombia. He thought the plant was Victoria amazonica, the famous giant water lily of the Amazon. The new plant has floating leaves up to 2 metres wide.

In 2021, Carlos Magdalena, a plant expert at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, in the United Kingdom, saw the photos. He knew that nobody had ever reported a giant water lily from the Orinoco Basin. The Inírida River is part of the Orinoco system, not the Amazon. He told Mongabay that as soon as he saw where the picture was taken, he knew it was special. He has studied these plants for more than twenty years.

A photo was not enough, so Magdalena first asked Harris exactly where he had taken the pictures. Then he searched satellite images of the river and the lakes nearby until he found the leaves of one plant. Harris said these were the same plants that local guides had shown him. It took several more years to get the money and permission for a trip.

Magdalena joined a team from Bogotá’s botanical garden and people from local Indigenous reserves on a five-day trip into the flooded rainforest. For days they found nothing. Then their driver told them where to look. With only 10 hours left before their flight home, the group left at 1 a.m. and travelled deeper into the forest. Their guides came from the Tucano community, who are known for finding their way through these waters. In the thick forest, GPS and phone signals did not always work.

Just before sunrise, they reached a small lake and found five plants. One of them had a flower. In total, the team saw seven plants in two lakes. Then they hurried back and caught their flight. Magdalena told The Guardian that it was so emotional he cried, and that he will remember the moment for the rest of his life.

The flower was important. Tech Times says that without Gustavo Melo, a man who knew the waterways and where the plants grew, the team would probably not have found a plant with a flower, which the scientists needed. The official plant that now defines the species was collected on 28 July 2024 at Cejal Lake, in the El Paujil Indigenous Reserve. Melo and Magdalena were two of the five people who collected it. The name of the species simply honours the country where it grows.

Why did such a big plant stay unknown for so long? Magdalena told Mongabay that it is very rare and grows in places where people almost never go. There may be more plants hidden in the many rivers and lakes of the Orinoco region. The team says that searching satellite images will be very important in looking for them.

Harris is now one of the authors of the study. He told The Guardian that his friends always laughed at him for taking selfies with plants. He said he felt very excited and happy.

Because there are so few plants, the team plans to ask the International Union for Conservation of Nature to list the water lily as critically endangered, which means it is in very great danger.

One idea is to grow the plants in a lake that is easier to reach, still on Indigenous land. This could bring visitors to the area and keep a safe group of plants. Magdalena’s team is trying to collect seeds to grow plants in botanic gardens and near the Indigenous communities. They hope to grow it in Bogotá and, if that works, maybe one day at Kew. “Giant waterlilies give away their secrets slowly,” Magdalena said.