Thousands of Aussies to line up extraordinarily uncommon ‘corpse flower’ that smells like rotting flesh – because it lastly blooms after years in a single state
Aussies are queuing around the block just to get a glimpse of a flower which has just bloomed, but there’s a twist – it smells like rotting flesh.
The giant, foul-smelling plant’s bloom officially kicked off when the Adelaide Botanic Garden opened at 7.30am on Saturday.
The Titan Arum has been nicknamed ‘Smellanie’ by staff at the garden where the extremely rare flower resides.
A 20-year conservation effort by those working at the garden has painstakingly recreated the ideal conditions for Smellanie to bloom in time for the long weekend.
Its smell is described as a ‘pungent aroma’ of ‘fleeting appearance’, resembling cheese, fermented cabbage and roadkill.
The breed of flower is native to Sumatra, in Indonesia’s west, and is one of the world’s largest flowering plants.
On average, the flower can grow up to three metres in height when fully bloomed.
It’s endangered, however, and it is estimated that there are fewer than 1,000 of them in the wild.
The Adelaide Botanic Garden’s rarest flower is now in full bloom
‘Smellanie’ the Titan Arum is the result of 20 years’ worth of work on the part of garden staff members who have been painstakingly creating the perfect blooming conditions for it
Botanic Gardens and State Herbarium of South Australia (BGSH) horticultural curator Matt Coulter stressed the importance of the latest bloom for the park.
‘We received a donation of three seeds in 2006, and from that small starting point have grown a collection of around 250 Titan Arum plants,’ he told news.com.au.
‘Approximately 100 have been propagated from leaf cuttings and 150 through cross-pollination, in addition to the original three plants.
‘Smellanie has emerged from a tuber generated by one of those original seeds and marks the second time this particular plant has flowered, following its last bloom in 2021.’
Thousands of people have lined up for a chance to glimpse Smellanie’s bloom since the garden’s opening this weekend.
Visitors had the chance to take in its smell from the garden’s opening until 12pm and then from 7pm to midnight on Saturday.
More slots for smell sessions are available between 10am and 4pm on Sunday.
Thousands have lined up at the park for the opportunity to smell the stench of Smellanie
Botanic experts have advised visitors that the plant’s aroma will peak within 12-24 hours of its initial bloom.
The extreme stench is the plant’s attempt to attract pollinators with its unique smell particularly suited to beckon carrion beetles and flesh flies towards it.
Roughly 48 hours after the rapid bloom, Smellanie’s giant yellow spadix, which rises from the centre of its petals, will begin to collapse.
The plant flowers every two to five years and when it does, the bloom lasts two days.
The aroma, made up of 70 different compounds, expels every 30 to 60 seconds.
