The Weirdest Parasite on Earth

Credits:
Narrator: Stephanie Sammann
Writer: Lorraine Boissoneault

References:
[4]

[rirururu]

I learned about these flowers in animal crossing. If you neglect your town long enough then these things start growing and making its own ecosystem.

[countchocula]

imagine deciding that photosynthesis isn't useful 💀

[axelotlee_]

Whenever I learn about a parasitic insect I hate them with all my guts, but for some reason when the parasite is a plant, I'm just thinking "you go girl"

[alexthetiger]

So this must be the flower that the Pokemon Vileplume is based on. It's always fascinating to see the real world connections.

[Darkflowerchyld]

There's a preserved Rafflesia on display at the American Museum of Natural History in Manhattan that never ceases to amaze me. I'm a small statured woman and this flower is more than half my size. I've always appreciated the fact that it's no longer smelly though I have always wondered how bad it truly smells.

[fancifuldreamer]

Depending on the temperature reached by thermogenesis, another possible reason for it might be to further mimic decaying carcasses, which produce some heat as they decompose.

[dannyUg]

Damn, props to the dudes who found it for not burning the whole forest down after lol

[sulaymanfaghirzadah]

I learned about this flower on a school trip, you could press a button to smell it, and i had that smell stuck in my body and lungs for an entire hour. The smell and size were the only two/2 things i knew about this flower.

[jamesthedoctor]

Thank you for this information about Vileplume!

[kiyull_p]

We have these growing in our backyard back then. my grandpa cut them off, it never grew back after a few times cutting the flower. It's sure is magnificent seeing it up close.

[donbrashsux]

I saw these flowers up near Mt Kinabalu in Borneo its diameter measured around 700 mm and yes it did smell .. Borneo is full of amazing weird things and it’s one of my favorite countries to travel through

[mooodeang]

I've seen these in Borneo, and yes, they smell bad, but it's absolutely nothing compared to Swedish surströmming(fermented herring), unrelated but I was walking on the beach the other day and came across a semi decomposed seal, even that was nothing compared to the Surströmming.

[souffle]

I remember a video about an Indonesian that *grow* this flower in his backyard.

This plant is a parasite of a certain vine, so all he did was _implanting_ the whatever-it's-called (bulb?) on a mature vine, then watch them bloom on his backyard.

The vine need big tree to climb, so to plant this Rafflesia, you will need (i) the bulb of Rafflesia, (ii) the vine as its host plant, (iii) big tree for its host plant to climb on, and (iv) humid environment.
I remember his backyard was quite shaded, with rich black humus and puddles everywhere. The host plant (vine) itself was about 10cm in diameter.

I just Googled it. Seems like the host plant is from genus Tetrasigma, a type of tropical wild grape.

[geoffrygifari]

some things i note:
1. is rafflesia the same kind of flower like in other flowering plants? or is it just an organ that mimics the shape of a flower
2. Interesting that some flowers smell nice, and others smell terrible, but seemingly for the same purpose
3. How is it possible that horizontal gene transfer happen in macroscopic eukaryote?
does rafflesia has a similar cellular machinery to bacteria to accomplish this?
5. Where is rafflesia in the evolutionary tree? i imagine a plant as weird as this might be evolutionarily isolated
and have only few relatives (like the case of platypus and its relatives for mammals)
6. How can rafflesia be so difficult to cultivate outside their natural habitat, while we can do that with titanarum?

[ruthhopeful]

Interesting, maybe the role of this plant is, like so many limiting factors in nature, to control the population of insects by eliminating their larva

[strikermodel]

5:17
Let me tell you, staph is a very serious infection. I have a staph folliculitus infection that is resistant to antibiotics. I've been on various antibiotics for a year now. I've been seeing an infections disease specialist for about half that time.
My skin, going from my feet up to my knees, is covered in painful, itchy, bleeding sores that do not heal. They'll form scabs, but the skin under those scabs won't recover. I've had some of these scabs for over a month, and when I accidently scrath them off, it bleeds as if it were a fresh wound.
I haven't been able to work because sweating causes my condition to worsen. At first I was able to do non-physical jobs for a short time, but now my arms are starting to break out too. My sores are contact spread on people and surfaces, so I can't work most jobs at all.
Make sure to cover your wounds carefully and shower a minimum of once each other day. If you are worried about something on your skin, go see a dermatologist. It's worth the ~80$ to avoid being in a state like mine.
Remember, preemptive care is always more effective than reactive care.

[nektu]

It looks like a flower you'd find in an old 16 bit side-scrolling platformer video game from the early 90s. 🌺☄️🚶🏻‍♂️🌸📺🎮

[Cursivealpha]

Always cool to see what inspired certain pokemon. *A wild Vileplume appeared*

[LoveHandle]

They don’t call it “The Corpse Flower”, for no reason now.🌹

[terezaherrmannova]

What a brilliant video. I'm not as much into botany as zoology but this was super interesting. I have never heard about stinky flowers.