(12 Aug 2006)
1. The Corpse Flower at the Brooklyn Botanical Garden in New York City
2. People looking at the flower
3. Man smelling the flower
4. Woman smelling the flower
5. SOUNDBITE (English) Alessandro Chiari, Brooklyn Botanical Garden
"It's a beautiful flower and it really stinks very, very bad. It's rare in cultivation and it's rare in the wild and that's why everyone wants to just come here and look at it."
6. Workers preparing to pollinate the plant, in hopes they can bloom others in the near future (the last bloom in New York City was in 1939)
7. Workers preparing pollen for the plant
8. Workers dabbing camel hair brush into pollen
9. Various of workers applying pollen to the plant
10. SOUNDBITE (English) Amy Segal, Plant Observer
"I don't know if it's appropriate to have so many people present when plants are having sex, but it was kind of wonderful to watch."
11. Corpse flower sign
12. SOUNDBITE (English) Mariya Yudkevich, Plant Observer
"This plant sex was pretty interesting, it was something new, I don't really see plant sex on a day to day basis."
13. Woman watching the flower
14. Little girl watching flower
15. Man drawing flower
16. Pan up on Corpse Flower
STORYLINE:
The big stink is over and a giant flower at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden is beginning too wilt.
The exotic flower, native only to Sumatra and known as Amor-pho-phallus ti-tan-um, bloomed last night with its strong aroma that smells like rotting eggs or dead flesh.
It is the first time in New York City in 67 years that the odoriferous flower bloomed.
Experts and plant lovers have watched with awe as the exotic flower called "Baby" by its handlers, burst into bloom after ten years of nurturing from seeds.
In the past ten days, Baby has grown from 35 inches to 63 inches tall and to 33 inches around.
The last time one of the plants blossomed locally was at the New York Botanical Garden in the Bronx in 1939.
When the big red flower blooms the plant gives off an odor that has been compared to rotting meat.
It also explains why it's often called the "corpse flower."
Although humans may turn up their noses to the odor, insects - such as bees and carrion beetles - love it.
The plant began blooming Thursday afternoon and by that evening, it was giving off its signature pungent odor that emanated well into Friday morning.
But by Friday afternoon, visitors had to get right next to the unusual flower to take the dreadful whiff.
Alessandro Chiari, the BBG's plant propagator, thinks it will end its bloom by Sunday, when it will wilt and collapse.
However he says he's gotten pollen from the flower to breed more of the plants.
About 50 people who stopped by Friday witnessed the next stage of the flower's life process: its pollination.
Chiari used camel hair brushes to apply fine yellow pollen to the female part of the plant.
The pollen came from Virginia Tech University, which has its own Amorphophallus titanum.
If the pollen takes, the plant will sprout small red fruits in the next few weeks from which the museum will take seeds
and grow more flowers.
The plant's male section should have pollen available for the taking by Sunday, Chiari said.
Workers plan to store that pollen and send it to other groups who have similar plants so that they can keep the breeding going.
The plant doesn't self pollinate, handlers said.
While obnoxious to humans, its smell is ambrosia to the insects _ sweat bees and carrion beetles _ that pollinate
the flower in the wild.
In captivity, the plant needs to be pollinated artificially.
Keyword-wacky -bizarre
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