The stake to the world's largest flower can be given to one of many different plants, depending on how you classify flower. Technically the plant with the largest flower is the parasitic Rafflesia arnoldi from the indonesian islands. The absolute largest flowering inflorescence, is the massive terminal stalk that shoots out of the amazonian Talipot palm (Corypha umbraculifera). But, the largest single, unbranched inflorescence goes to the titan arum (Amorphophallus titanum), it is truly an amazing sight to be seen.
The scientific name for the titan arum is Amorphophallus titanum. Its roots are Greek. Amorphos means "without form" or "misshapen". Phallos peans "penis" and titan means "giant". I'm sure the phallic figure of a blooming titan arum does look a bit like a misshapen giant penis, especially to explorers that were trecking through the hot Bornean jungles. The common name titan arum, refers the fact that it is an giant arum, the name given to members of the family Araceae.
Like the largest single flower, the Rafflesia, the Titan Arum emits an unmistakable corpse-like smell. It attracts putative pollinators such as carrion beetles and blow flies that might otherwise be looking for a piece of a carrion. A combination of the smell and the heat released by the arum creates a much stronger attraction for these insects.
The titan arum was discovered by Odoardo Beccari in Sumatra in 1878. Corms, which may weigh as much of 100 pounds and have a diameter of half a meter were brought back to botanical gardens. Yet, the plant has bloomed very few times in the gardens and when it does flower the nearly six foot yellow-red stalk lasts for only about 3-4 days.
In 2006 a rare botanical flowering event occurred where three titan arums flowered at the same time. A study by Barthlott studied the heating of the central column. He showed that the central column would heat up in pulses originating from the base. It would reach a temperature of 36 degrees. The following is a picture from that study.
Arriving at Gustavus Adolphus College in Minnesota to see an Amorphophallus titanum, or Corpse Flower, a rare plant native to Southeast Asia. There are only a few in botanical gardens and greenhouses across the country, so I was super excited that one was blooming close enough so that we could go see it.
The whole room reeked of roadkill!! The Corpse Flower produces a sulfurous odor to attract fly and beetle pollinators.
This is not the largest flower in the world (that title goes to a member of the genus Rafflesia), but it's the largest inflorescence, or cluster of flowers, in the world. This plant grew from a seed the size of a walnut that was planted in 1993. This is only the second time that this plant has bloomed in seventeen years because it takes a very long time for the plant to store up enough energy to produce such a large inflorescence! We got there just in time. The inflorescence only lasts about 48 hours. It was already starting to wilt!
The outer purple sheath is called the spathe, the tube-like structure is called the spadix. Plants that you've probably seen that look similar and are in the same family (Araceae) are: Calla lilies, Anthurium, and Dieffenbachia.
I just had to get a closer whiff! It's amazing that one plant could smell so incredibly rancid! They cut a tiny window into the spathe so we could see (and SMELL!) the hundreds of male and female flowers. (Right-hand photo: male flowers above, female flowers below)
This is another Titan Arum they are growing. I'm looking at the single leaf that this plant produces. When it fully opens it will look like a little palm tree. A single leaf will last a couple of years and then it will die back and another will replace it. This process will continue for about 10 years until it finally flowers!
Scratch "See a Corpse Flower" off the bucket list!! What an adventure!
Links:
[1] http://aob.oxfordjournals.org/misc/terms.shtml
[2] http://www.kew.org/kbd/detailedresult.do?id=256092