The corpse flower: is this the world’s smelliest plant?

Name: The corpse flower.

Age: It takes up to 12 years for the titan arum to flower for the first time.

A plant, then? In the family Araceae and endemic to the rainforests of Sumatra. Amorphophallus titanum if you’re a botanist.

From the Greek for “giant misshapen penis”? Correct. Because of its tall, not un-willy-like yellow spadix of flowers that emerges from a maroon spathe, which looks like a massive petal.

So it’s big? The largest unbranched inflorescence in the world, up to three metres high. But its size is not what it is most famous for.

What, then? Clue’s in the name. In Indonesia it’s called bunga bangkai …

Sounds like a party Silvio Berlusconi might have once thrown for his chums in finance. Wrong country, wrong language. Bunga means flower, bangkai corpse.

And “corpse” because? That’s what it smells like. Rotting flesh. The odour attracts pollinators from up to half a mile away.

Eww. Well, Indonesia’s many miles away (unless you’re reading in Sumatra, of course). They have some at Kew Gardens in west London. It’s where the titan arum flowered for the first time outside Sumatra, in 1889. The second time it bloomed, in 1926, it attracted massive crowds and the police were called to control them.

It doesn’t happen often? Flowers are both rare and unpredictable. The plant can take years to rebloom. But it did happen, in the Princess of Wales Conservatory at Kew, this week.

Quick! Taxi to Kew! Too late – a bloom lasts for just 24-36 hours and the foul stench is emitted only for a single evening. You’ll have to wait to inhale the aroma of the world’s smelliest plant.

Is that right, world’s smelliest? I can also offer the eastern skunk cabbage of the North American wetlands, the blooms of which are said to smell like roadkill skunk.

Nice. Or Hydnora africana, which might resemble female genitalia but smells more of faeces. Probably why it’s so attractive to dung beetles.

OK. The flowers of the carob tree, on the other hand, are said to smell of semen, if that’s more your thing.

You know what, I’m just going to stick with the corpse flower for now, thank you. The good news is they have several at Kew, so you might not have to wait too long. Another one flowered just a couple of weeks ago.

Do say: “A perfect opportunity to raise awareness of the fragility of its native habitat.”

Don’t say: “Hahaha. No, officer, we’ve just got a flowering titan arum, down there in the basement …”