US visits Corpse Flower

This week an amazing botanical event went down in the Bay Area! Trudy, the "Titan Arum" or "Corpse Flower" at the UC Botanical Garden bloomed. Why is this amazing?? Trudy is 16 years old, hadn't bloomed in 4 years, and her blossom was 6 feet tall! It only stayed open for about one day, and gave off the stench of rotting flesh in order to attract the flies that would pollinate it in its native home in Indonesia.

Walter and Adriani, youth and adult staff members respectively, went along with me to Berkeley to check out this massive and stinky blossom (in photo). Although Trudy was already starting to close up her blossom and was no longer stinky, we were so thankful for the opportunity to see this massive tropical flower.

We loved the rest of our tour at the garden as well, thanks to Christine Manoux who showed us around! We were all so inspired and felt like we had travelled the world after strolling through the Asian, South American, and African sections of the garden. What a special visit!