Amorphophallus titanum(Titan arum)
A plant native to western Sumatra, growing in rainforests.
It consists of a fragrant spadix of flowers covered by a spathe which looks like a large petal.
The fragrance resembles a rotting meat attracting beetles and flesh flies for pollination.
The spadix is deep red in color with two rings of small flowers.
The upper ring bears male flowers and the lower ring bears female flowers(red colored stigma).
The female flowers open first, the after one or two days the male flowers open preventing the self-pollination.
At the time of blooming the spadix has a human body temperature which helps the smell to volatilize into the air and reach long distances. After pollination, the flower dies and a single leave (of a size of a small tree) grow from the underground corm.The pollinated flowers develop a globose berry of varying colors depending on species.
Each year the old leaf dies and a new leaf grows.Leafs are born on a green stem.
Since the flowers are large and produce powerful smell it takes a lot of time and energy to bloom.
But the question is if the plant is producing carrion-like smell to attract the insects ,then why it is not producing sweet smelling flowers.
A plant native to western Sumatra, growing in rainforests.
It consists of a fragrant spadix of flowers covered by a spathe which looks like a large petal.
The fragrance resembles a rotting meat attracting beetles and flesh flies for pollination.
The spadix is deep red in color with two rings of small flowers.
The upper ring bears male flowers and the lower ring bears female flowers(red colored stigma).
The female flowers open first, the after one or two days the male flowers open preventing the self-pollination.
At the time of blooming the spadix has a human body temperature which helps the smell to volatilize into the air and reach long distances. After pollination, the flower dies and a single leave (of a size of a small tree) grow from the underground corm.The pollinated flowers develop a globose berry of varying colors depending on species.
Each year the old leaf dies and a new leaf grows.Leafs are born on a green stem.
Since the flowers are large and produce powerful smell it takes a lot of time and energy to bloom.
But the question is if the plant is producing carrion-like smell to attract the insects ,then why it is not producing sweet smelling flowers.
No comments:
Post a Comment