Corpse Flower Bloom at the Huntington Library

When you read this, the opportunity to see this amazing flower will have probably passed (I went August 24, 2014). The corpse flower as it is known, is a massive and stinky flower found natively in Sumatra. There have been a little over a dozen blooms in the United States and the Huntington Library is one of the main places to see it as they have had five blooms in the last 15 years. For up to date info check out their page here.

Having not bloomed since 2010 this was a special year for the library as it got a massive bloom from the plant known as “stinky”. It blooms for about 36 hours total and the petals themselves can extend out to three feet, while the plant can get 6 feet tall. We headed down as soon as we heard it had bloomed and waited in the line to see this very unique occurrence.

There was a massive line constantly full of people but the wait was only about 20 minutes. Once inside you can stay as long as you like, here are a few pictures of the line. The flower itself also gives off a pretty gross scent which is what it uses to attract pollinators in the jungle and how it got its name.

The attendant who was near the flower, offer to take peoples cameras and took pictures of the plant from up close. I gave him my camera and it was awesome to be able to have these shots, you can see them below.

There also was a cut out of the bottom of the flower that showed what the inside looked like.

All in all this was a super cool experience. I have never seen a flower this big in my entire life and there is a good chance I will not see one again. If you as interested in seeing a bloom make sure to check the libraries Twitter, Facebook and Instagram this time next year to see when / if it will bloom again.