My desription of Phil the Titan arum yesterday generated quite a bit of interest, and I was compelled to return to photograph the now-blossomed Phil.
Well, not quite blossomed, but getting there. If you look at the bottom (click to biggify) you can see that a 4″x4″ hole has been cut in the bottom to permit people to see the interior. Phil was supposed to be pretty stinky by now, but I think that much of eight-hour stench window had passed by. It was pretty nasty, sure, but more like the smell of a fishmonger’s at the end of a long day and less like a rotting corpse.
The greenhouse was quite the hive of activity — the Titan arum was just about always surrounded by a dozen or so people, in various stages of amazement, stench-revulsion, posing, and photographing. (Followed by denial, then regret, then acceptance.)
The first thing that people over 5′ do when they walk up to the flower is gaze down into it. It looks like this.
The first thing that people under 5′ do is look into the little
Amazement, as can be seen here, is a pretty reasonable reaction to seeing the interior of a Titan arum.
Stink horror is also a pretty reasonable reaction.
I expect that the blossom will open up further tomorrow, and I think that the leaves fall off from there, and the decade-long life cycle begins anew. It blossomed late yesterday, and it’s on its way out.