It’s one of the world’s largest flowers, it stinks of rotting meat or rancid cheese and looks very much like a giant penis.

The Amorphophallus Titanum — literally “the giant strangely shaped penis” — has been attracting big crowds at the National Botanic Garden of Belgium on the outskirts of Brussels.

The rare phallus-like flower that springs from the plant only survives about 72 hours and its timing is completely unpredictable, said Gert Ausloos, head of education at the garden…

Also known as Corpse Flower, it releases a strong smell to attract pollinators, thought to be sweat bees.

Thousands queued to see — and smell — the 1.6 meter tall specimen on Thursday…

First discovered in 1878 in western Sumatra, the plant was first cultivated in Europe at the Royal Botanic Garden, Kew, in London in 1889. Because of its appearance, Victorian women were kept from viewing it.

Don’t look! Don’t look!




  1. Fair Trade says:

    As a gift it definitely offers the ability to ‘say it with flowers’!

  2. Special Ed says:

    “it stinks of rotting meat or rancid cheese”

    Mom??

  3. lou says:

    Thats some lame porn.

  4. Freyar says:

    I can’t believe it took me *calculating…* four years to figure out what that creepy gardening guy in GTA: San Andreas was talking about.

  5. jbellies says:

    Wake up and smell the heather! Oops, wrong thread. We have several Dracunculus in our garden. We started with one. They spread. Smaller, but just as pungent, with a purple penny. Is that the right singular diminutive? And easy to grow (here in Zone 8)!

  6. OvenMaster says:

    How the hell does that yellow thing resemble a penis?

  7. WiseGuy says:

    @6- by shear size alone. isn’t yours that size?

  8. bill says:

    The one in San Francisco at the ‘hall of flowers’ in Golden Gate Park is bigger!

  9. paddler says:

    Man if your penis looks like with rancid cheese smell coming from it may be symptomatic of much larger problems. Ask your doctor about it right away.

  10. BubbaRay says:

    Once your olfactory nerves have finished uploading an extremely negative report to your brain and reverse peristalsis has subsided to the point where cognitive thought can resume, you will wonder, “Geez, who have I so truly offended today to deserve this?”

  11. Stephanie says:

    Yeah, the Belgiums must have strange genes because that doesn’t look very phallic to me. “Cone” may be more aptly named.

    An interesting experiment may be to give it a penicillin shot and see if it still stinks!


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