The Flower That Smells Like a Rotting Corpse

In this video: Deep in the heart of Indonesia’s Sumatra rainforest, where tigers hunt, rhinos stampede, orangutans play, and cuckoos sing, blooms a flower that does its very best to attract more attention than any of the animals. The rare Amorphophallus Titanum, or Titan Arum, or known by its more descriptive nickname the “Corpse Flower,” is described as the world’s largest flower. But that isn’t the plant’s claim to fame. No, this rare, beautiful fauna is really known for its stink.

This video is #sponsored by Curiosity Stream.

[JimFortune]

"You know what doesn't stink?" Seamless segue.

[heidijones]

I clicked on this video bc I wanted to see how on Earth you could talk about a stinky flower for ten minutes plus and make it entertaining. Good job, Today I Found Out. Somehow you took a topic I had zero interest in and made it enjoyable.

PS) I have enjoyed the Podcast too. Keep up the good work.

[heatherbleu]

As an embalmer I've yet to encounter the corpse that smells like a flower. The hunt continues..

[filleirlandaise]

My grandmother has a voodoo lily in her backyard, which is of the same family as the corpse flower. While it is much smaller than a corpse flower (it grows to be about 6ft high maximum), I can confirm that when it blooms, it definitely smells like a dead animal. It has so far resisted all efforts to get rid of it--I think it's pretty much unkillable!

[Alanpie]

"Fauna" means "animals". The corpse flower is a plant, or "flora".

[redchic]

A cousin of this plant found it's way I to my yard, the voodoo lily. At first I was surprised by the flower but I was shocked by the stench. Lol I had to move it to a spot that's down of all the windows. But I still find it hilarious when it's in bloom and I hear someone outside gag and start a diatribe of curse words that usually begins ' wtf is that smell.... Ugh... ' it cracks me up every time.

[Kezenmacher]

I actually had the joy, of seeing this wonderfull plant flower twice so far ( and I'm still fairly young ). I saw it in Kiel, Germany, in the Botanic Garden of the town

[Ellie-qqzm]

Omg I live literally less than a mile away from the Huntington Botanical Gardens. This past year there was another bloom, but I haven’t gotten around to experiencing it yet.

[TheJonathanExp]

Personal experience: a decaying body most closely smells like particularly bad breath. After my first experience (reporting a man that hung himself in 2012) anytime I smelled bad breath it would trigger intense flashbacks.

[IchibanMoto]

chicago botanic garden has two of them

[naomibousson]

Where I work, we have a few of these plants. The first time I smelled it I also thought the scent resembled garbage that was left out in the sun for too long. I've never smelled a corpse, so I concluded that a corpse smells like garbage. ;-)


By the way, I have huge respect for our botanists and gardeners who are in charge of growing these plants. The whole process sounds really difficult.

[shezpluscats]

Was lucky enough to see the corpse flower at the Cleveland Metroparks Zoo when it bloomed earlier this year. Smelled like meat when it had been sitting out just a little too long. This year was the 4th time it’s bloomed in I think 25 years.

[ninehundreddollarluxuryyac]

We timelapsed a titan that bloomed at Fairchild Tropical Gardens in Miami Florida in 1998 or 9. Next to it was one of the plants during its non-blooming stage. The tall, single stalk is not hard or woody, so it has to stand near vertical to prevent the stalk for breaking under its own weight. The time-lapse movie revealed that the stalk swayed around incredibly slowly, taking several hours to sway back and forth. Somehow the plant is either growing faster or pumping more water into the side of the stalk experiencing the most pressure (because the plant leans to that side just a tiny amount), and this pushes it back toward vertical. This mechanism is constantly adjusting to keep the stalk as close to vertical as possible.

[mgmcd]

I’ve been at the blooming of close to a half dozen of these flowers, and while there is a roadkill sort of smell, one can definitely detect a floral note that indicates it is a scent mimic rather than the real thing. 🤓

[bradpuckett]

I got a whiff of this when it bloomed in Princeville back in August

[officerdailey]

There is a far more intriguing topic hidden within this story. The corps flower, like all species, have evolved to take advantage of its environment... but how. How on earth does it know that the insects it wants to exploit like rotting flesh. Somehow I doubt it just randomly came up in conversation. And once it learned this piece of info, how did it figure out how to emulate the stench. It would take a lab of scientists and equitment for us to do such a thing. Nature truly fascinates me sometimes.

[fvckyoutubescensorshipandt]

I wish I could plant those in the backyard woods of my apartment building just to troll the local cops. Eventually it could be used to cover up the smell of actual corpses since they would eventually assume it was just the flower and not bother investigating, which would be far more convenient than dumping them in the local river.

[Legio__X]

I unfortunately have had the misfortune of smelling rotting corpses on several occasions and i can say with certainty that it’s WAY worse than old garbage. Like way worse lol.

[uss_]

“Check it out, it looks like a flower, but it smells like a corpse”
“What should we call it?”
“Corpse flower”

[ericwright]

I have a tiny one of these guys. It has bloomed once in about 8 years so far. Can confirm. It's foul, positively wreaks. The first flower was only 8in tall but you could smell it 15ft away.