By Cris Greer

WKTV Managing Editor

greer@wktv.org


The rare and stinky corpse flower was in full bloom on Monday, June 17, at the Frederik Meijer Gardens & Sculpture Park.

It attracted some 6,000 visitors who witnessed the beauty and stench, according to John VanderHaagen, Director of Communications at Meijer Gardens.

“The stink is hard to describe”

“It began to open up and reveal its beautiful red inside, and then the stink … the stink is kind of hard to describe. I would most liken it to … on a hot 95 degree day like we’ve been having lately, a deer that’s been hit on the side of the road and has been rotting for a week or two. It’s just that pungent. It’s amazingly disgusting, but such a phenomenon that we had about 6,000 people come in over the last few days to take pictures with the flower, stick their nose in it and smell it, be disgusted, and then enjoy the rest of the beautiful gardens that we have here at Meijer Gardens.”

Lovingly named The Beast by the GVSU biology department staff, it was on display inside the Grace Jarecki Seasonal Display Greenhouse at Meijer Gardens. The Beast is on loan from GVSU and is part of their permanent collection.

The corpse flower (Amorphophallus titanum) – also called titan arum – is one of the largest and rarest flowering plants in the world. The unpredictable blooming cycle makes each event a notable occurrence. It can take up to a decade to produce a flowering structure, and blooms for only 24 to 36 hours.

Its distinctive odor attracts pollinators, including carrion beetles and flesh flies, that feed on dead animals and is at its most pungent during peak bloom.

The corpse flower can grow up to 10 feet tall and 4 feet wide. Its leaf structure can reach up to 20 feet in height and 16 feet across. Although the enormous plant in bloom resembles one giant flower, it actually comprises a fleshy central spike called a spadix that holds two rings of male and female flowers, wrapped by the frilly spathe, a modified leaf that resembles a petal.

While the corpse flower’s bloom is short-lived, the plant itself can live for 40 years or more. It spends much of its life cycle as a dormant underground tuber. The corpse flower is native to the rainforests of Sumatra, Indonesia and was first reported in 1878.

“This is an incredibly exciting and unique thing to experience,” said Steve LaWarre, Senior Vice President of Horticulture at FMG. “Many people go through their entire careers never seeing an example like this in person.