Photo: Wheaton College Livestream
NORTON, Mass. (WBZ NewsRadio) — A corpse flower by any other name would still smell just as awful.
Amorphophallus titanium, better known as the corpse flower, is on the verge of blooming at the Wheaton College greenhouse in Norton.
The rare plant native to Indonesia gets its name from smelling like rotting flesh when it blooms after several years.
"The point of this plant smelling this bad is to attract flies and other bugs, who think they are going to find a dead animal out in the jungle and either eat it or lay its eggs in it," greenhouse horticulturalist Ben Robbins told WBZ NewsRadio Sunday. "So when the bugs go down there to try to find the dead animal, they unwittingly carry the pollen and pollinate the plant. And then they can fly away."
The stinky flower is expected to bloom sometime within the week and will only last a day or two.
"The first night is the stinkiest night, but it does stay stinky for the full time it’s blooming, which is max two days," Robbins said.
"I’ve never smelled one before, but it should be pretty exciting when it [blooms]," said biology major Katherine.
Wheaton has set up a livestream for people to watch the corpse flower bloom from around the world. Smell-O-Vision is thankfully not part of the video.
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