Eight of the World’s Most Unusual Plants
Weird is relative. What seems weird to me might not seem weird toyou. In the plant kingdom, however, there are definitely some speciesthat most people would acknowledge are highly unusual.
1. Rafflesia arnoldii: this parasitic plantdevelops the world's largest bloom that can grow over three feetacross. The flower is a fleshy color, with spots that make it look likea teenager's acne-ridden skin. It smells bad and has a hole in thecenter that holds six or seven quarts of water. The plant has noleaves, stems, or roots.
2. Hydnora africana, an unusualflesh-colored, parasitic flower that attacks the nearby roots ofshrubby in arid deserts of South Africa. The putrid-smelling blossomattracts herds of carrion beetles.
Image Credit: Martin Heigan (via creative commons)
3. Dracunculus vulgaris: smells like rotting flesh, and has a burgundy-colored, leaf-like flower that projects a slender, black appendage.
4. Amorphophallus: means, literally, "shapeless male genetalia." The name comes from the shape of the protruding black spadix.
5. Wollemia nobilis: This bizarre-lookingtree was known only from 120 million-year-old fossil leaves before1994; fewer than one hundred exist in the wild. They have strange barkthat looks like bubbles of chocolate, multiple trunks, andferny-looking leaves growing in spirals. They can grow up to 125 feettall.
6. Welwitschia mirabilis consists of onlytwo leaves and a stem with roots. Its two leaves continue to grow untilthey resemble an alien life form. The stem gets thicker rather thanhigher, although this plant can grow to be almost six feet high andtwenty-four feet wide. Its estimated lifespan is 400 to 1500 years.Mirabilis grows in Namibia, and is thought to be a relic of theJurassic period.
7. Drakaea glyptodon: an orchid. It is the color of, and smells like, raw meat. Pollinated by male wasps.
8. Wolffia angusta: the world's smallestflower. A dozen plants would easily fit on the head of a pin and twoplants in full bloom will fit inside a small printed letter "o."
