The Corpse Flower

Nature has some seriously weird stuff brewing in jungle, it seems there’s no end to the discovery of new plants. On this episode we’ll unveil a flower that smells like rotting flesh.
The Titan Arum or corpse flower is a perennial herb that is one of the largest flowers in the world and has the largest collection of tiny flowers called the inflorescence. Predominantly grown in Sumatra, Indonesia this flower has a creep factor of 10/10. Measuring 20 feet or 6 meters tall and 15 feet or 4.5 meters across, this flower draws big crowds once it begins to open. The corpse flower’s bloom, which only happens a few days a year at which the flower will smell like rotting flesh. It’ll open up at night time which draws in carcass eating insects, mainly beetles and flies, these insects will pollinate the inflorescence, that white spike in the middle for 2 days until it closes back up. The tiny flowers or inflorescence will heat up during the bloom which releases the rotting flesh smell, this heating process is designed to help spread the horrid smell and attract pollinators. The reason for this scent is a sulfur based compound but luckily it only lasts 8 hours of the 2 day bloom. When cultivated it takes 7 - 9 years to produce a flower. Tim Grigg, a horticulturist at Eden’s nursery has had exceptional success with these flowers by pollinating them by hand. Multiple conservatories around the world have one of these bizarre flowers, some of which are available for the public to see.
The first successful bloom of the corpse flower was at the Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew in London in 1889 which has enjoyed over 100 cultivated blooms since. In the United States the first bloom was in 1937 and 1939 at New York’s Botanical Garden. The corpse flower became the official flower of the Bronx in 1939 only to be replaced by the day lily in 2000. In 2003 Germany’s Botanical Garden at the University of Bonn achieved the tallest cultivated bloom measuring 8 feet 11 inches or 2.74 meters tall. This record was broken a few more times has horticulturists have become more experience with the flower.
An analysis of the chemicals involved in creating a stench was done which found dimethyl trisulfide which smells like limburger cheese, dimethyl disulfide and trimethylamine which smells like rotting fish, isovaleric acid resembling sweaty socks, benzyl alcohol adding a sweet floral scent, phenol smelling like chloraseptic and indole which smells like human feces. What a great combination nature!
Have you heard of this flower before? Do you know of an equally bizarre plant you want to see featured on our channel let us know in the comments down below.
Source:
https://www.livescience.com/33265-most-disgusting-deadly-flowers.html
http://www.edenproject.com/learn/for-everyone/plant-profiles/titan-arum
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cz4gi8mhBvw
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4-iTg5fnKBU
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zSwXcl_Frww
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amorphophallus_titanum

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