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Rare "Corpse Flower" Set To Bloom

Posted by timothy on from the let-a-thousand-corpses-bloom dept.

BearJ writes "And you thought Halley's comet was rare. For the first time in the northeast since the 1930s, a Corpse Flower, or 'Amorphophallus Titanum' is set to bloom at the University of Connecticut. Check out the press release and the official page . Oh, and it's called the corpse flower due to its putrid smell, apparently to attract dung beetles. I wonder if I could find some for my garden..."

47 of 57 comments (clear)

  1. Ummmm..... by DesScorp · · Score: 2, Funny

    It's a dick.

    And now we're posting stories on giant penis flowers on Slashdot?

    --
    Life is hard, and the world is cruel
    1. Re:Ummmm..... by bigsteve@dstc · · Score: 4, Funny
      Yes folks ... all flowers are sex organs.

      So, next time you buy a bunch of flowers for your girlfriend, why not remind her of the plants that have been castrated for her enjoyment? (Just a thought :-)

    2. Re:Ummmm..... by TheHans · · Score: 1

      According to this Titan Arum fact sheet from the Botanic Gardens in Sydney Australia the flowers scientific name (Amorphophallus titanum) means "huge deformed penis. "

    3. Re:Ummmm..... by operagost · · Score: 1
      So it looks like a huge penis, and smells like crap.

      Somebody's getting a piece o'dat booty.

      --

      Gamingmuseum.com: Give your 3D accelerator a rest.
    4. Re:Ummmm..... by merlin_jim · · Score: 1

      And now we're posting stories on giant penis flowers on Slashdot?

      I for one welcome our new giant penis flower overlords.

      --
      I am disrespectful to dirt! Can you see that I am serious?!
  2. Dennis the Menace by haydenth · · Score: 1

    Where's Dennis the Menace to ruin the whole flower blooming? DENNIISSSSSS

    --
    - tom -
    1. Re:Dennis the Menace by denis-The-menace · · Score: 1

      Here I am!

      Hey, I tried to find a still of that scene you're talking about. Couldn't find it.

      --
      Obama's legacy: (N)othing (S)ecure (A)nywhere and (T)error (S)imulation (A)dministration
    2. Re:Dennis the Menace by rizzo420 · · Score: 1

      http://www.imdb.com/gallery/mptv/1093/Mptv/1093/96 79-8.jpg?path=gallery&path_key=0106701

      i think that's the closest you'll get. that's after the flower died and mr wilson got pissed.

      --
      please me, have no regrets.
  3. Another one... by FreshMeat-BWG · · Score: 3, Informative

    At Stephen F. Austin State University in Nacogdoches, TX is also preparing to bloom. SFASU Arboretum

    1. Re:Another one... by Spock+the+Baptist · · Score: 2, Funny

      The Stephen F. plant is named Jack by the way.

      So to those who've not visited the SFASU Arboretum recently...

      YOU DON'T KNOW JACK!

      --
      "Oh drat these computers, they're so naughty and so complex, I could pinch them." --Marvin the Martian
    2. Re:Another one... by RobertB-DC · · Score: 1

      We live nearby, so I took the kids to Nacogdoches to see the huge flower. On Saturday (7/10), the plant (named Jack, as previously noted) was 4'10" and had started to slow down. We and Dawn (the research assistant) noticed that Jack was starting to ooze a bit of fluid, and Dawn speculated that the Big Event was about to occur -- the oozing may have been some overflow from the chemical cocktail brewing inside.

      Sunday, Jack's frills began to open, and by Monday night, he/she was in bloom. We're not making the drive again, but the pictures are great. Here's a link to the photo gallery (let's see how their IS department holds up):

      jackpics.htm

      The best thing about driving to Deep East Texas to see the flower: there's no crowds, no lines, no big-city hoopla (I'd have never known if it weren't for Slashdot). Just you, the researchers, a rather rickety greenhouse, and a very, very large plant.

      --
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  4. it's not about to bloom, it's done by clsc · · Score: 5, Informative
    A day or so too late, it seems:

    Amorphophallus Titanum 2004 Daily Progress

    1. Re:it's not about to bloom, it's done by CanSpice · · Score: 2, Informative

      Uh, what? Did you happen to read what that page says? It says that it opened half-way, then closed up a bit, and they don't know what it'll do next. They know it hasn't fully bloomed yet.

  5. And to celebrate... by WormholeFiend · · Score: 5, Funny

    durian smoothies for everyone!

  6. Rarer than Halley's Comet? by CodeMonkey4Hire · · Score: 2, Informative
    Our largest Amorphophallus titanum is finally producing its first flower bud after 10 years since planting from seed.
    That means this thing was planted way back in... 1994. Very long time ago.

    The last time Halley's comet came by was 1986. It isn't due again until 2061. Oh, and there's only one Halle's comet. Bad analogy.
    --

    Let's go Hurricanes!!! 2006 Stanley Cup Champions!!!
  7. Re:Smells fishy by sporktoast · · Score: 5, Informative
    Fishy is an awfully kind way to describe the smell of the blossom.

    You are probably thinking of the one that bloomed in Germany in May, 2003. Slash also reported on one back in 2001 in Wisconsin.

    I wouldn't call three specimens in four years blooming "all the time". There have been only about 15 recorded blooms in the United States. That's not blooms in a year, that is blooms at all. This is not a garden variety daylily we're talking about.

    --
    In a related story, the IRS has recently ruled that the cost of Windows upgrades can NOT be deducted as a gambling loss.
  8. Re:Smells fishy by stu42j · · Score: 2, Funny

    You mean this one:

    or:

    or perhaps:

    That last one may be a different flower but what is the deal with slashdot's obsession with large stinky flowers?!?

  9. Not as rare as one might think by dacarr · · Score: 3, Informative
    The Fullerton Arboretum over at CSU Fullerton has one that has been recorded as blooming twice in four years - in 2000 and 2003. For those curious, heeeeeeere's Tiffy!

    There was also a bloom in 1999 at the Huntington Library in San Marino, CA - which they pollinated from in Fullerton in 2003.

    So that's three in five years here in sunny southern California. Put that in your pipe and smoke it.

    --
    This sig no verb.
    1. Re:Not as rare as one might think by dacarr · · Score: 1

      This is slashdot. Who cares about basketball? =^_-=

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      This sig no verb.
    2. Re:Not as rare as one might think by michaelredux · · Score: 1

      There was also a bloom at CSU Chico a few weeks ago

  10. I can't get there in person... by dpbsmith · · Score: 3, Funny

    ...so can someone post a URL from which I can download the smell? (.wma format preferred)

    --

    "How to Do Nothing," kids activities, back in print!

    1. Re:I can't get there in person... by Alsee · · Score: 1

      Don't you mean .wms format?

      -

      --
      - - You can't take something off the Internet! That's like trying to take pee out of a swimming pool.
  11. Re:Smells fishy by M1FCJ · · Score: 1

    There was one blossom of this plant a couple years ago in Cambridge, UK. Probably you remember that one. I was living in Cambridge at that time but never bothered to go and smell how it smelled. Now I live 10 miles outside Cambridge, I simply wouldn't bother at all.

  12. Re:Smells fishy by Lars+T. · · Score: 1

    Actually, the (same) one in Bonn (Germany) also bloomed in 2000 and before that they had 6 blooms since 1937. Maybe the guys in Connecticut should ask for some gardening tips ;-)

    --

    Lars T.

    To the guy who modded me down from perfect to terrible Karma - Apple haters still suck

  13. Dennis' Sister!!! by vijaya_chandra · · Score: 1

    This little girl on the home page does seem to have some mischevious ideas.
    Who knows, may be she turns out to be dennis' long lost sister

  14. Smells by 4of12 · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Long ago I read somewhere that the smell of a human corpse was considered the most repugnant to the human nose.

    From an evolutionary perspective, in the propagation of disease, I can well imagine why.

    --
    "Provided by the management for your protection."
    1. Re:Smells by WormholeFiend · · Score: 1

      I've never smelled a rotting human corpse, but I've had the misfortune, in the past, of discovering dead rotting animals, eg mice, a cat, a racoon, a skunk.

      With the exception of the skunk, they all had a similar smell. I would assume we don't smell that different from other rotting mammals.

    2. Re:Smells by IBX · · Score: 1

      Rotting animals smell differently: there is a noticable difference between rotting cow and rotting pig smell (pig has a pork-chops like tone into the rot).

      The worst smelling odour ever is Phe-PH-Me, methyl phenyl phosphine - It smells completely rotten sweet, like corpses mixed with over-ripe watermelons. I got fired from a university lab for making the stuff. (We did it on Sunday, in a remote abadoned lab. We though we de-contaminated all the glassware with bleach. I guess we just paralyzed our noses and could not smell the stuff anymore. We then brought the glassware back to our lab. The professor came back on Monday and that was end of my project and my work there. They actualy evacuated the whole building - we were late, people there were getting sick from the smell and they could not figure out what was it and where it was comming from)

    3. Re:Smells by WormholeFiend · · Score: 2, Insightful

      so, how do you make this methyl phenyl phosphine? (I'm assuming by chemical reaction, not by letting something rot...)

    4. Re:Smells by IBX · · Score: 1

      Take triphenylphosphine, reduce off one phenyl with sodium in liquid ammonia (or potassium in hot dioxane), alkylate the produced diphenyl phosphide anion with methyl iodide, reduce off the second phenyl. Isolate and purify by vacuum distillation. The entire synth 3-step sequence can be done in one flask.

      Oh, and the apparatus with residue after the distillation likes to catch on fire when you let the air in. It is realy wonderful chemistry.

    5. Re:Smells by WormholeFiend · · Score: 1

      It is realy wonderful chemistry

      a stink-bomb with spontaneously combusting residue? hell ya!

  15. Same at UCDavis last year by timothv · · Score: 1

    UCDavis had one bloom last year as well.

  16. The ultimate subterfuge... by moonboy · · Score: 4, Funny



    The ultimate subterfuge for the bodies buried in the backyard.

    "Oh, that smell? It's just my Amorphophallus Titanum."

    --

    Co-founder and designer at Music Nearby: http://musicnearby.com
  17. Re:Smells fishy by Steve+Cox · · Score: 1

    Actually, he was correct - THREE of these flowers bloomed at Kew Gardens, London, UK in 2002.

    Timeline photos of the blooms can be found:

    Here for plant 4
    Here for plant 2
    Here for plant 3

    Another one bloomed in 2003:
    Here for plant 3

    Steve.

  18. Re:Smells fishy by Steve+Cox · · Score: 1

    Damn. Faffed up the numbers on the links. A total of 4 plants DID flower at Kew Gardens in 2002 & 2003, its just the numbers on the links that are screwed up.

    Steve.

  19. Some personal Pictures from "Opening Day" 7/6/04 by Gadgetfreak · · Score: 2, Informative

    Since this is the Science page, I think the server can handle it... I hope.

    Corpse Flower Pictures

    Nothing makes you more proud of your Alma Mater than a gigantic stinky flower.

    I'm a MechE, though, so the Biology thing is still interesting as a novely.

    --
    "No fair, you changed the outcome by measuring it!" - Professor Hubert J. Farnsworth
  20. Is it named Audrey II ? by ericspinder · · Score: 1

    I saw that thing and thought Little Shop of Horrors (the original movie), or for that matter... Invasion of the Body Snatchers (the orginal movie). Man, that is one big pod...

    --
    The grass is only greener, if you don't take care of your own lawn.
  21. Actually, there's a good substitute that closer... by Gadgetfreak · · Score: 1

    I visited it last night, and I was somewhat surprised to find that the smell was much more remeniscent of soiled diapers rather than rotting carcass. I'm sure you must know someone with a baby...

    --
    "No fair, you changed the outcome by measuring it!" - Professor Hubert J. Farnsworth
  22. Re:Actually, there's a good substitute that closer by rizzo420 · · Score: 1

    have you ever smelled a rotting carcass?

    no?

    didn't think so...

    --
    please me, have no regrets.
  23. Yes... just not a human carcass by Gadgetfreak · · Score: 1

    And I know you have too.

    --
    "No fair, you changed the outcome by measuring it!" - Professor Hubert J. Farnsworth
    1. Re:Yes... just not a human carcass by FLEB · · Score: 1

      Okay, let's compromise... dead baby corpse.

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      You just want to be cheap.
  24. Re:Actually, there's a good substitute that closer by ckaminski · · Score: 1

    I have. They don't call it the sweet smell of death for nothing...

  25. Unoriginal by sbb · · Score: 1
    Simpsons did it (Moe Baby Blues).

    Jeez... now the plant world is trying to rip off the Simpsons. They really have done *everything*.

  26. Same by Arbogast_II · · Score: 1

    Same plant. They had one on loan at the Atlanta Botanical Garden a few years back. It is a neat looking plant.

    --


    HenryJamesFeltus.com
  27. Triffid by TwistedSpring · · Score: 1

    Man that's how I always imagined a triffid. Interesting that it's called the amorphophalus. Clearly whoever discovered it had a sense of humour.

  28. Not a first? by toby · · Score: 1
    Unless I am mistaken, the Montreal Botanical Garden had one in bloom, or about to bloom, during my visit around January 2000.

    --
    you had me at #!
  29. Comment removed by account_deleted · · Score: 1

    Comment removed based on user account deletion