Corpse Flower In Chicago Botanic Garden Fails To Open In Spite Of Help From Scientists

At last, after a week of showing that it was on the brink of blooming, one corpse flower at the Chicago Botanic Garden did not. There are eight arum flowers in the Garden, but this was the flower that everyone was focused on.

It's called Spike by the garden staff, and lined up the fans who were dying to see it bloom. Scientists at the garden were trying to get it to oblige. On Sunday, they snipped its outer layers from the base even as the curious crowd was looking on.

"It's disappointing that it didn't open because it's really quite splendid. They're amazing plants. Their flowers are amazing and their odor is amazing," Patrick Herendeen, conservation scientist at the Chicago Botanic Garden, told the Chicago Tribune. "However, this is not unprecedented. It just didn't perform as expected. But that's just like our garden plants at home."

However, people haven't given up still. Herendeen said that one day, "Spike will bloom again."

This one looks pampered, but this corpse flower, or the titan arum, is rare. Called Amorphophallus titanum, it lives in Sumatra, existing every 40 hectares in the wild. Although it blooms rarely, it lets out a pungent smell like decaying meat to attract pollinators like flies.

"In the wild, they're trying to attract dung beetles, flesh flies, insects that would actually be attracted to a dead animal," floriculturist Tim Pollak, who has taken care of Spike since it was a seed, told CBS News. "And then the coloration of the flower is also to make it look like meat, too. All of those things are alluring, or tricking, those insects for pollination."

The rarity of its existence got Spike its pop star value at the Chicago Botanic Garden. It even got a 24/7 livestream broadcast in order to capture the opening of its leaves, according to CBS News.

However, it was a flop show, so everyone is wondering why.

The main reason is its lack of energy that could not make it complete its maturing process, said scientists at the Chicago Botanic Garden. Pollak and conservation scientist Shannon examined its inner leaves, but did not find pollen, which indicated that it was not developed completely. Hence, they just removed its outer layers.

Chicago Botanic Garden scientists have explained that they will go on checking it for pollen development and why it did not mature completely, according to hngn.