7 Bizarre Flowers

[Subodh Kansal]

 

Never Come Across

Not all flowers symbolize love, romance, and beauty. These unique flowers are the proof.

Clockwise from top left: Suzanne Cadwell/Flickr, Wikimedia Commons, yellowcloud/Flickr, Derek Keats/Flickr; ATI Composite

Unique Flowers: Rafflesia arnoldii

One of the largest and rarest flowers in the world, the rafflesia makes a better backdrop for a science fiction cartoon than a romance novel.

Lacking any kind of roots or leaves, this monstrous, parasitic flower is known to sprout from the cracked bark of trees. But what’s even stranger is the awful stench — like that of rotting flesh — that permeates the air when it is in bloom.

It is this rotten odor along with the flower’s leathery, meat-like petals that serve to attract carrion flies, which in turn help to pollinate this bizarre flower. If you’re interested in smelling it in the flesh, head to Sumatra, where the “corpse flower” is endemic.

Naked Man Orchid

Mark Freeth/Flickr

No, this image has not been edited. In the Mediterranean region, there exists a strange flower that looks like a tiny, well-endowed man.

Strange as it is, this flower is actually highly sought after. The flower’s tubers can be used to make a starchy flower called salep, a common ingredient in the popular confection known as Turkish delight. It’s also plucked for its homeopathic properties (it’s thought to be an effective antidiarrheal). And, as you’d guess, this flower is also a popular aphrodisiac.

Its desirability may also lead to its demise, though: this plant has now been pushed into threatened status.

Unique Flowers: Corpse Lily

Wikimedia Commons

One might imagine that one of the world’s rarest, largest flowers would resemble something out of a fairy tale. However, not everyone imagines the hulking behemoth that is the corpse lily, which at nearly ten feet tall can only be found in its native home of Borneo.

What’s even more rare than stumbling upon one of these lilies is finding one that is in bloom. Taking place every ten years, botanists from around the world will travel to Borneo to see a corpse lily in its 12-hour bloom.

And during that bloom, it emits a stench that has been compared, in scientific literature, to all of the following: sweaty socks, human feces, limburger cheese, and rotting fish.

White Egret Orchid

Wikimedia Commons

With over 27,000 species of orchids blooming across the globe, it’s not hard to imagine that some of the stranger ones might rank among the world’s most unique flowers.

Japan’s Habenaria radiata certainly fits that bill, aptly earning the name “white egret orchid” due to the striking resemblance it bears to its avian counterpart. With its lovely fringed petals unfurling like an egret’s wings, this unusual orchid is a hot commodity due to its rarity in the wild.

Japanese development may be pushing the flower into even more obscure status. The flower, now endangered, thrives in bogs and marshes which are often destroyed in favor of rice fields.

Hydnora africana

Derek Keats/Flickr

Looking more like some type of alien creature than a flower, the bloom of a living stone (also known as a “subterranean plant”) can come with some otherworldly benefits.

A rather common find in certain southern African regions, this plant can lay underground for up to a year before it emerges and blooms. But when it does — foul smell and bizarre appearance aside — this flower serves as a food source and even acts as an astringent for acne treatments.

Unique Flowers: Living Stones

yellowcloud/Flickr

Both the world’s most common and most unique flowers are often seen as delicate; too little or too much water can be life or death for more sensitive blooms.

For the Lithops genus, however, water is only an option. These strange flowers are often referred to as “living stones” due to the stone-like structures from which daisy-like flowers can sprout.

Since this plant ordinarily makes its home in southern Africa’s arid climate, these unique flowers have evolved to be virtually drought-proof; this makes them ideal for an amateur gardener who just can’t seem to keep their plants alive.

Beehive Ginger

Suzanne Cadwell/Flickr

Easily considered to be one of the most unique flowers the world has to offer, the beehive ginger looks more like a pinecone than a flower.

Much like its name suggests, this flower is a relative of the ginger family, a fact that’s most apparent when it perfumes the air with its sweet gingery scent. The flowers themselves are very tiny, blooming between the little honeycombs or “bracts,” and are often said to resemble white honeybees.

While the actual flowers are tiny, the full beehive ginger plant can grow to be an astounding six feet tall and is coveted due to the fact that the flower and honeycombs remain fresh and colorful days after being cut.