Unfortunately, it is now time for Elenore to unwind after all of the excitement. Our crews are taking her away for some much needed rest at her other greenhouse home. Thank you for all of the attention and love everyone has shown her! Hopefully we won't have to wait so long to see her again!

• This corpse flower (Amorphophallus titanum) is the largest non-branched inflorescence in the world! An inflorescence is a cluster of small flowers. The large, maroon ruffle (spathe) actually helps protect the tiny flowers located as the base of the center spike (spadix).
• These plants can reach over 10 feet tall, just slightly smaller than their cousin, the Giant Voodoo Lily (Amorphophallus gigas).

The flower blooms for a short period of two to three days about every 10 years.

• Elenore is the baby of Lenore that last bloomed in 2013. It grew as an offset of the underground corm and was removed from the mother plant in 2017.
• The corpse flower doesn’t have a set schedule for when it will bloom. It takes lots of energy for this plant to form the flower, so it’s not uncommon for there to be years between blooms.

If the flower is pollinated, after the spathe and spadix collapses, the fruits on the plant take around 6-12 months to mature.

• The flowers clustered at the base of the spadix are divided into female flowers on the bottom and male flowers above. They open at different times, so the plant cannot pollinate itself. To have fruit and seeds, the plant requires cross-pollination from pollen of another corpse flower plant.
• Botanic Gardens will trade pollen with one another for fruit and seeds to set and to increase the genetic diversity of these special flowers.

When the plant is not blooming, it forms one huge leaf that can reach 12 feet tall and is patterned with a mosaic of blotches. Between the appearance of each leaf, the plant enters a dormant period of several months.

• The plant stores the energy made from the leaf in its corm, the tuber-like, nutrient storing part of the stem that is underground.
• Other plants that have corms are taro, gladiolus and crocus.
• The corm generally must weigh at least 30 pounds to support a bloom.

As the name hints, this flower is incredibly stinky when it blooms! It is often compared to decomposing matter.

• This smell often attracts pollinators like carrion beetles and flies. The flower also produces heat as it blooms, further spreading the flower’s stench.

The corpse flower is on the IUCN (International Union for Conservation of Nature) list because there are estimated to be less than 1,000 individuals in the wild.

• This plant is currently listed as endangered. This is due to deforestation and conversion of the land into oil, palm, or timber plantations.