World's Largest Flower

An anonymous reader writes "The Titan Arum (Amorphophallus titanum) produces the world's largest flower and is currently in bud at the University Botanic Gardens Bonn (Germany). As of Thursday, 12 a.m. it is set to break the old world record established in 1932. The old record was 267 cm while the new bud is now 273 cm and still growing."

Comments

What's the flower...

[heliocentric]

What's the flower that has that really hudge bud, only opens like every few years, and smells of rotted flesh? If memory serves me it is from the amazon rain forest. Anyone remember the name of that thing?

Re:What's the flower...

[coward_2.0]

You would be correct.. smeels strongly of rotting fish. Lovely.

Re:What's the flower...

[danratherfan]

"The Titan Arum flowered the last time at Bonn in Juli 2000. The flower with the shape of a fountain has had a diameter of 1,5 m and reached almost 2,60 m in height. It was the third largest flower of the Titan Arum in cultivation ever. Within 3 days the plant - strongly smelling of decaying fish - attracted some 15.000 visitors to the Botanic Garden of the Poppelsdorf Castle."

I believe it's called the Titan Arum.
My trick? Reading.

Re:What's the flower...

[heliocentric]

Thanks for the support, it's always good to know kind people are on the 'net to help. I found the thing I was looking for referred to more directly as The Corpse Flower and that was the name I most identify with it. Never heard of something with the specific "decaying fish" armoa, just the non-descript "flesh." Also of note a Corpse Flower is in bloom in California I beleive, and that made local news.

Thanks for your help.

Re:What's the flower...

[holy zarquon's singi]

What's the flower that has that really hudge bud, only opens like every few years, and smells of rotted flesh? If memory serves me it is from the amazon rain forest. Anyone remember the name of that thing?

Rafelasia a parasitic plant from the South East Asian rainforests (the Malay side of the Wallace line). There is some excellent footage of it on David Attenborough's Private lives of plants. Definately bigger (wider) than the Amorphophallus titanum but not as tall.

Re:What's the flower...

[RedWizzard]

Rafelasia a parasitic plant from the South East Asian rainforests (the Malay side of the Wallace line). There is some excellent footage of it on David Attenborough's Private lives of plants. Definately bigger (wider) than the Amorphophallus titanum but not as tall.

Rafflesia arnoldii grows to about a 1m diameter. The Titan Arum in bloom in Bonn has a diameter of 1.5m. So the Titan Arum is both taller and wider than Rafflesia. However the flower of the Titan Arum is not really a flower, it is infact an "inflorescence", a cluster of flowers (the largest in the world).

Name it

[lechuck80]

They named it Audry II, and that kid is standing way too close in a few of those pictures.

Slashdot fun

[aridhol]

Look - they have a graph of hits over time at the bottom. Let's see how well that thing scales ;)

Lawn

[Samus]

I don't think this is the type of flower your neighbors would like you having in the front yard. When its sprouting it has somewhat of a phallic nature to it and then it smells like rotting fish. I've heard of other flowers that have horrible odors and people sending the plants to "friends" as practical jokes. Can anyone name a few of these nasties?

Re:Lawn

[arivanov]

Rafflesias, all of them. Smell of various decaying flash, look like normal cactii. Originally from South Africa

They have a live webcam

[DeadSea]

Live Webcam of the flower. As I post there are a bunch of people standing around looking at the flower and the flower dwarfs all of them. Quite impressive.

Not in MY livingroom!!!!

[Rxke]

This monstrusosity smells 'like decaying fish,' people actually paying to see the plant live, beware! Much safer for yer nostrils to see it on the web.

The Big Stinky

[moonboy]

I saw something about this the other day. I think the workers there refer to it as the "The Big Stink" or something like that. Supposedly it periodically puts off a horrendous odor. Probably a SBD (Silent But Deadly).

Re:The Big Stinky

[scrawny]

more info about the smell and its purpose. Google on 'corpse flower' for even more.

Bud? Did someone say "Bud?"

[Hee Hee Hee]

Duuude!

Excellent!!

World's biggest flower means the world's biggest Bud! Fire one up and let's PARTY!

(Wouldn't my mom be proud of me right now? "There's my baby - posting to Slashdot.")

Re:Bud? Did someone say "Bud?"

[BrynM]

It's nice to know, even in our modern times, that someone is still out there trying to eat/drink/smoke anything. Humanity couldn't have gotten this far without willing testers like you dying off to prove things like we can't smoke kerosine, but we can salt meat to make it last longer.

Little Shop of Horrors?

[linuxator]

Wonder why it's smelling like rotten fish... maybe it's not fish that is rotten... Have you guys seen "Little Shop of Horror"? ;)

way cool

[RevAaron]

I was in Germany on an exchange trip 6 or so years ago, and my host family had taken me to a botanic garden where they had a speciment of this species. I was totally bummed- I had finished flowering before I saw it, and was all wilted and dead-looking.

Even dead it was surreal, the sheer size of it. The size of the pot, the size of the dead leaves... it was rad.

Ok, I admit it, I'm a plant nerd. I've always been interested in plants, be it plant population ecology or ethnobotany or the care and feeding of entheogenic plants. Now a days I'm an aspiring computational ecologist. So yeah, I'm a sucker for this stuff.

Re:way cool

[lindsayt]

I was totally bummed- I had finished flowering before I saw it, and was all wilted and dead-looking.

If you had just finished flowering and were all wilted and dead-looking, no wonder you were bummed. What sort of one-night stand leads to a child who flowers?

Seriously though, that would be cool to see. Good luck with that computational ecology stuff.

Amorphophallus Titanum

[lindsayt]

This thing seems to have been named quite aptly.

Going back to our Latin roots:

• Amorpho = amorphous = Lacking definite form or shapeless
• phallus = phallus = male penis or female clitoris, or a representation of the penis illustrating generative power
• Titanum = titan = of prodigious size, strength or achievement

So this flower is "scientifically" defined as an unusually huge and shapeless representation of the male penis. This is why men shouldn't name flowers...

Of course to be fair, that gigantic flower is after all the plant's sex organ, so perhaps the description is apt...

Definitions courtesy of Dictionary.com

Re:Amorphophallus Titanum

[s-orbital]

So basically a flower with a scientific name of "Huge Misshapen Dick" There is a flower to give to your S/O.

Re:Amorphophallus Titanum

[axolotl_farmer]

Did you check the link? The name isn't actually too bad a description of the flower!

There is a genus of flatworms called Gonocephalus! Check that in your latin dictionary.

Re:Amorphophallus Titanum

[FreeUser]

Going back to our Latin roots, [...] this flower is "scientifically" defined as an unusually huge and shapeless representation of the male penis. This is why men shouldn't name flowers.

Well, it does look like a big honkin' dick, so perhaps it was aptly named after all.

I find it remarkable (and very cool) that there exists a flower that has naturally evolved to be so large and, well, colorful. Methinks a little genetic intermingling with redwoods could lead to a very, very cool, mondo Dogwood-esque blooming tree.

Or perhaps we could try some even more baroque variants, creating new forests of diverse and strangely delightful plants. However, I would avoid anything carnivorous ... the last thing we need is a sequioa sized venus fly trap (though that would keep the tree huggers and loggers alike at bay, but then, too, the spotted owl would likely not fair to well in its branches either).

Re:Amorphophallus Titanum

[Tablizer]

So basically a flower with a scientific name of "Huge Misshapen Dick" There is a flower to give to your S/O.

Why not? That way she is ready for the real thing from you later. (All those years of cheap porn take their toll.)

Re:Amorphophallus Titanum

[pfafrich]

Going back to our Latin roots:....

A good site for the mreanings of Latin Names of plants is Dictionary of Botanical Epithets.

I've taken these names and incorperated them in the Plants For A Future Database of useful plants.

Now that's a corsage...

[eXtro]

If that doesn't get you into your prom dates panties nothing will.

Re:Now that's a corsage...

[geoswan]

You don't think the stench of rotting fish would detract from its seductive qualities?

Re:Now that's a corsage...

[presearch]

You don't think the stench of rotting fish would detract from its seductive qualities?

Do you mean the the flower or the prom date?

Re:Now that's a corsage...

[Anonymous Coward]

3/4 of the comments and finally a comment like this... I thought slashdot was losing it's divine inspiration.

DON'T TOUCH IT! They're from outerspace!

[Tired_Blood]

DON'T TOUCH IT! HACK THEM ALL INTO PIECES!

The plants are from OUTERSPACE!!!!!

It's a conspiracy! The "people" involved make you believe that the pod is really a big flower, but really it's a HUMAN BODY REPLICATOR! It'll suck the LIFE out of you WHILE YOU SLEEP! The site even shows how the pods are human size! That child was just hatched!

[shouting] That doll is *Evil*, I tells ya. Evil! Eeeeeeviillll!!!

Re:273 cm?

[Anonymous Coward]

273 cm == 107.48 in.

Re:273 cm?

[spotted_dolphin]

Ummm... The conversion is 2.54 cm = 1 inch. We're talking about at a flower which is 107.48 inches or almost 9 feet.

Undoubtedly

[megabulk3000]

This will doubtlessly make Jim Woodring happy.

The smell

[netkgb]

It smells like decayed fish because, in the wild, the smell attracts every bug in a 5 mile radius to come and pollinate it.

I'd make a filthy joke, but I think it's implied.

[HookedOnTheBrothers]

Do the Mario!

Swing your arms from side to side
Come on, it's time to go, do the Mario!

Take one step, and then again
Let's do the Mario! All together now!

You got it!
It's the Mario!

Do the Mario!

Swing your arms from side to side
Come on, it's time to go, do the Mario!

Take one step, and then again
Let's do the Mario! All together now!

Come on, now!
Just... like... that!

If thats the flower

[headbulb]

http://www.botanik.uni-bonn.de/botgart/amorphotita kl.jpg I would hate to see what insect pollonates it.

Re:If thats the flower

[Anonymous Coward]

The child in the picture is pollinating it. We are about to rub his face in the thing, and then we'll walk him over to the other side of the room and rub his face in the other one. Watering eyes from the overpowering stench of the magnificent flower dramatically improve pollination.

Dr. Heinrich Fuhrerhen
Bonn Dept. Of Botany

Re:If thats the flower

[Anonymous Coward]

That would be a michigan mosquito

Re:I'd make a filthy joke, but I think it's implie

[heliocentric]

Are you a fan of Group X - Mario Twins?

What kind of nutrients

[Muhammar]

I cannot imagine what kind of nutrients in soil can support such a fast-growing monstrosity. Do they have to feed it live sheep?

Re:What kind of nutrients

[Anonymous Coward]

Do they have to feed it live sheep?

I am sure they will not feed it live sheep

Simpsons Episode

[i_am_nitrogen]

The Simpsons Episode featuring this flower was on a few days ago. It was also the episode where Moe becomes a sort of second father for Maggie.

Suddenly.... (susan)

[KurdtX]

All of a sudden Little Shop of Horrors seems a lot more scary - it seems a lot more possible now. Just need to hide a wireless speaker in there to really scare people.

Growth rate

[p3d0]

If I calculated correctly, looks like this thing sustains a growth rate of more than 5.6cm/day for for almost two straight weeks, and ends up just slightly taller than Robert Wadlow, the tallest man in history. Yowsers.

Flowered now at 274cm

[henrygb]

but the webcam doesn't work at night.

Re:273 cm?

[Anonymous Coward]

God you're stupid. 273 cm = 3.4 in? Dumbass.

now if they could

[geekoid]

just genetically engineer one that smells like a rose, and you could make a fortune.
Or make it smell like fruit loops.