The largest flowers and what they are called. What is the name of the largest flower in the world?

The wonders of nature surprise us again and again. Flowers come in different varieties - the enchanting aroma and delicate buds delight both in a bouquet and on the lawn. But there are such giants that it would be somewhat strange to admire them. The world's largest flower was discovered in Sumatra and Java.

Surprisingly, such a large flower (its diameter reaches one meter) grows from a seed the size of a poppy seed. First, the stem grows through the bark of the plant, then forms a bud, somewhat similar to a head of cabbage. When the bud ripens, it opens and in its place appears a giant flower with five petals. White warts are generously scattered on the surface.

Exuding the aromas of rotten meat, the flower attracts insects and flies - they act as a pollinator. The flower dies after four days, and after another seven months, a large fruit is formed, which contains thousands of small seeds. In order for the seeds to sprout new shoots, the help of a large animal is needed, which, having crushed the fruit, will spread them around. So Rafflesia repeats the circle of its development over and over again.

This unique plant has become a godsend for many cosmetic companies - Rafflesia contains complex essential oils, the miraculous properties of which are difficult to overestimate. They can get rid of acne, allergic rashes, smooth out fine wrinkles - make the skin smooth and elastic.

Due to the widespread deforestation of tropical forests, this plant is on the verge of destruction.

Amorphophallus (Voodoo lily)

This unusual and spectacular plant grows in the tropics. This flower, which has a specific smell, is not for nothing considered the largest - its height and diameter can reach three meters. They grow from corms, each of which can weigh up to 90 kg. The flower attracts insects with its corpse-like aroma, and they act as pollinators. In the upper tier there are male flowers, and under the cape there are female flowers.

Flowering lasts two weeks. An interesting fact is that when flowering, the cob heats up to forty degrees. During flowering, the tuber gives off a lot of energy. Therefore, before releasing the leaf, it is in a dormant state. Restoration of resources may take four months; in principle, it may sleep until next spring. The leaves can reach a height of six meters.

Amorphophallus does not have a pleasant appearance or a pleasant aroma, but still arouses burning interest among ordinary people. The flower is quite unusual, and, moreover, rarely blooms. It was first discovered in Sumatra at the end of the 19th century.

The length of the cob reaches seventy centimeters, and judging by information from unconfirmed sources, the height of the flower can reach four meters. The lifespan of Amorphophallus is forty years, but it blooms no more than four times in its entire life.

When we hear the word “flowers,” we usually think of something elegant, colorful, and fragrant. However, in nature, not all flowering plants are miniature; there are also large specimens, and some are so large that it is difficult to even imagine.

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They are found as perennial herbaceous plants or small to medium-sized shrubs. Due to large, heavy flowers, they often need support. It blooms during the period late spring - early summer.

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Some species of this tropical plant - shrubs and trees that grow in the wild - have a trunk diameter approximately equal to the circumference of a human leg. Hibiscus plants are known for their large flowers that come in a variety of colors, such as red, yellow or orange.

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Although clematis is a fairly common flowering plant, not everyone knows that some of its species are impressive in size, for example, perennial climbing vines with large flowers of various colors.

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This flowering plant is widespread in Asian countries - Japan, China, Indonesia and Korea. Despite the large number of different species, most hydrangeas are shrubs 1–3 m high with large inflorescences.

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Unlike the other large flowering plants mentioned above, the sunflower is not a rare species - it is often found in a wide variety of natural areas. The apical inflorescences of this annual plant are quite large, and the stem can reach 3.5 m in height.

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Usually found in Bolivia and Peru. This species, also known as the Queen of the Andes, was first discovered in 1830 by French naturalist Alcide D'Orbigny. The peduncle of Puya Raimondi can grow up to 10 m in height!

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A marine flowering herbaceous plant that can often be found in the Mediterranean Sea. It is also known by another name - Neptune's grass. Posidonia has long leaves that look like ribbons from 7 to 10 mm wide, and its fruits resemble unripe olives in appearance.

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Known as the Talipot fan palm, this plant is native to India and Sri Lanka. It is considered the largest palm tree in nature - the plant trunk can reach a height of 25 m. Corypha umbellata blooms only once at the age of 30 to 80 years.

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Another large flower with an unpleasant odor, Rafflesia Arnold, grows only in tropical rainforests. The plant is similar to Titan Arum and is also often called the "corpse lily" due to its putrid odor. Rafflesia is considered one of the national symbols of Indonesia. The mass of the flower can reach 11 kg.

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This plant, also known as Titan Arum, has one of the largest inflorescences in the world. During the flowering period, the diameter of the blanket, which looks like a giant petal, reaches 1.2 m. The aroma of Titan Arum flowers is reminiscent of the smell of rotten meat, which is why it is often called the “corpse plant” or “corpse flower.” The plant can grow up to 3 m! They say that amorphophallus bloom once every 7-10 years, or they may never bloom at all.

We all remember the fairy tale “Thumbelina”. A little girl was born from a flower. He probably seemed simply huge to her. But this is fiction, fantasy. Are there really big flowers on our planet? Of course have. What Mother Nature hasn’t come up with!

Rafflesia Arnoldi

This is the largest flower in the world. His equal cannot be found on the whole Earth. This plant belongs to the Rafflesiaceae family, which has about 30 species.

Interestingly, Rafflesia arnóldii - the largest flower in the world - can only be found in the jungles on the island of Kalimantan and the island of Sumatra - the largest islands of the Malay Archipelago, which, in turn, is the largest archipelago in the world. How nature brought together all the best! Unfortunately, today this miracle is becoming less and less common. The giant Rafflesia Arnoldi is on the verge of extinction.

Other species of this family grow in areas of Southeast Asia - the Philippines, Indonesia, and the island of Java.

The miracle plant received its name in honor of two scientists:

• Joseph Arnold, an English doctor who discovered a huge flower while working in Sumatra. Although it is reliably known that Arnold was shown the miracle plant by a local resident, whose name remains unknown;
• Raffles Stamford, a naturalist who studied and described the new species.

The flower core has the shape of a bowl with high sides and a diameter of up to 1 meter (the largest known specimen had a core diameter of 1.6 meters). During tropical downpours, the core bowl collects 7-9 liters of rainwater. Around it are five petals 0.5 meters long and up to 5 cm thick. The total weight of the flower reaches 10 kg!

The Aborigines call it "lotus flower", "corpse line" or "carrion lily" because the flower has a terrible smell. A kilometer away, it smells like rotten meat. This exclusive “aroma” attracts flies that pollinate Rafflesia Arnoldi.

Local residents use the plant to prepare healing infusions. Men drink them to restore potency, and women drink them to maintain a good figure.

A very interesting development cycle of the largest flower in the world. The seeds (very small, difficult to even see; up to 4 million seeds ripen in one plant) penetrate under the bark of the “host” and freeze for 18 months. After a year and a half, they awaken and release thin sucker threads, with the help of which they begin to feed on the sap of the mother plant. Gradually, a thickening called a bud forms at the site where the seed is introduced. The bud grows and transforms into a large bud. This process takes 3 long years. The bud also blooms very slowly - another 9-18 months. But the “corpse lily” blooms for only 4-5 days, after which it turns into a black, shapeless mass that stores seeds. Animals that step on Rafflesia fruits spread these seeds throughout the rainforest.

Here is such an amazing, largest flower in the world - Rafflesia Arnoldi!

What other largest flowers grow on Earth? Amorphophallus Titanium is a perennial plant belonging to the Araceae family, which has more than 3000 species. The flower comes from the tropics, from the island of Sumatra. Unfortunately, today you can no longer find it there, since people have completely exterminated the strange plant. It has been preserved as a species in several large botanical gardens and scientific biological centers.

Amorphophallus grows from a huge tuber. The plant has a short powerful stem and a single giant leaf several meters wide, up to 3 meters long and 10 cm thick. This amazing representative of the flora blooms once every 7-10 years. Before this, it sheds its leaf and goes into hibernation for 3-4 months, gaining strength and nutrients. And then Amorphophallus throws out the flower.

The inflorescence of this plant is one of the largest in the world. It reaches a height of 3 meters and a width of 1.5 meters. Looks like a huge yellow cob. In its lower part is the flower itself in the form of a corrugated burgundy-purple cape. Another unique feature of the plant is that it heats up to 40°C when flowering.

Flowering lasts only 1-2 weeks. Because of its rarity and spectacular nature, the flowering of Amorphophallus is a major event in the world of botany. Tourists also do not want to miss such a moment, coming from all over the world to take a selfie next to the amazing flower.

The plant has only one, but very significant drawback: it smells strongly of rotten eggs, rotten fish and meat. For this deadly “aroma”, which simply eats away the eyes, the flower is called “rotting” or “cadaverous”.

This plant is not a flower, but I would like to mention it due to the fact that its inflorescence is the largest in the world. It has a height of more than 10 meters with a diameter of more than 2 meters! Consists of 12-15 thousand tiny flowers. Puya Raymonda throws out a peduncle and bears fruit only once at 80-150 years of age, after which it dies, leaving behind 10-12 million ripe seeds. They are carried around by the wind, but no more than 3-5 seeds germinate from the entire huge quantity. Puya grows in isolation, per 1 sq. km of range there is only 1 plant. So they stand, huge lonely candles, in Peru, Bolivia and the Andes.

Puya belongs to the Bromeliad family, which has a record number of species - more than two thousand! Named in honor of the naturalist Antoni Raimondi, who devoted his entire life to the study and description of this plant.
Puya Raymonda took home another gold medal - this plant is the oldest living plant on the planet. Scientists have nicknamed it the “dinosaur plant.” According to rough estimates, the species is several million years old.

Flowers are created to delight with their beauty and refined scent, but there are flowers that you are unlikely to be able to give to someone. This refers to the largest flowers in the world - giant flowers. One can only surprise with these flowers - both their size and their unusual smell.

From this article you will learn the name of the largest flower blooming on our planet Earth.

Of all the flowering plants, for their enormous size, the two largest flowers in the world are distinguished: in width and weight - this is Rafflesia arnoldii and in height - this is Amorphophallus Titanium. We’ll get to know them more closely in the article.

Rafflesia Arnoldi

This amazing flower, growing on the Indonesian islands of Sumatra, Java, Kalimantan, got its name from the names of the scientists who discovered it - T.S. Raffles and D. Arnoldi. The local population also calls it “lotus flower” or “corpse lily.” So far, only twelve species of rafflesia are known to exist.

The process of flower appearance is very long: it takes a year and a half for a bud to swell from a seed, and then 9 months to mature into a bud, which blooms in only 3-4 days. The rafflesia flower itself is bright red with white growths, but for all its beauty it has the smell of rotting meat to attract a large number of insects.

At the end of flowering, rafflesia decomposes and turns into a shapeless black mass that sticks to the hooves of large animals, thus ensuring the transfer of seeds to a new place.

Local residents value this flower and believe that rafflesia has a positive effect on sexual function and helps restore a woman’s figure after childbirth.

Amorphophallus titanium or titanic

This largest flower in the world was also discovered on the Indonesian island of Sumatra, but after people arrived there it was almost completely exterminated, so you can admire its impressive size in botanical gardens around the world.

The plant itself grows from a huge tuber and is a short and thick stem, at the base of which there is a single matte green leaf with white transverse stripes, 10 cm thick, up to 3 m long and 1 m in diameter, and above it there are smaller leaves.

Before blooming, and this happens once every 5-8 years, the amorphophallus sheds this leaf and begins a dormant period (about 4 months). And then the flower itself appears, 2.5 - 3 meters high: a yellow spadix, consisting of female (in the lower part), male flowers (middle part) and neutral (at the end), wrapped in burgundy-green cape - blanket. During flowering, which lasts only two days, the upper part of the cob heats up to 40°C and begins to emit a “aroma”: a mixture of the smells of rotten eggs, meat and fish, which is why locals also call it “corpse flower”. This amazing plant lives up to 40 years.

Growing this unusual flower in botanical gardens causes a great stir among tourists, since many people want, without visiting the tropics of Indonesia, to find out which flower is called the largest and smelliest in the whole world.

If you are unlikely to be able to have such giant flowers at home, then you may well be able to surprise your guests.

Have you ever thought about the diverse plant world that fills our planet? Thousands of amazing and unusual representatives of flora are scattered around the world, but even among them we can single out the most interesting and striking our imagination. Today we will talk about the largest flowers, perhaps one of the most beautiful creatures of nature, but is this always the case? Let's figure it out.

Rafflesia

Rafflesia is considered the smallest representative among the true flower giants, however, the diameter of this “flower” can reach 100 cm and weight – 7 kg! The numbers are impressive, but what does this amazing miracle of nature look like? Probably, in everyone’s imagination, one of the largest flowers in the world seems to be something extraordinary, indescribable beauty and splendor, real magic!

But that’s not the case: outwardly, rafflesia looks more like a huge piece of stale meat, and, it must be said, it smells accordingly. By the way, the specific smell, and the same appearance, of the flower giant is not accidental: the smell of rotten meat, although completely unattractive to people, well attracts various flies and insects, which are its best pollinators.

By the way, it also has a second name – “Corpse Flower”, which, in fact, is not surprising. Rafflesia grows in the jungles of Southeast Asia, and its flowering is considered a real event there, for which local residents have even learned to charge tourists for viewing.

Titan Arum

The next truly unique plant with a huge flower is Titan Arum, which consists of huge open leaves from which emerges a huge cob. Images of this amazing flower can be seen in numerous photos on the Internet, or you can go to its homeland, Sumatra. In size, Titan Arum can reach 1.5 meters in diameter, as well as more than 2.5 meters in height!

Like the previous representative of the giants, it cannot boast of a magical aroma or magnificent appearance: like Rafflesia, Titan emits an extremely unpleasant smell of rotting meat, which attracts flies that help the flower pollinate and reproduce.

It is difficult to care for such a unique creation of nature, so it is grown mainly within large botanical centers and institutes. Under natural conditions, Titan Arum blooms once every 10 years, but in captivity it blooms much less often, which is why such an event always causes a stir among the public.

Puya Raymonda

An amazing plant that grows in the Andean Puya Raymonda mountains, from where its name actually comes, is today the largest inflorescence in the whole world. In addition, this is one of the most ancient representatives of flora, and indeed living organisms in general, on the whole Earth. Amazing, isn't it?

The inflorescence of this unique plant can reach 13 meters in height, which is 4 times the height of its closest competitor, Titan Arum! Externally, the unique inflorescence is similar to a chestnut candle, albeit a very large and impressive one, which consists of individual small flowers. So, there are from 7 to 11 thousand such flowers in one inflorescence!

To grow such a huge inflorescence, the plant accumulates strength throughout its life, which is at the same time sad: after flowering, its above-ground part dies off, and only in rare cases can it continue to grow again. Basically, Puya Raymonda begins to bloom at the age of 50-80 years, however, there have been cases of flowering at 30 and 150 years of age.