I like weird and “exotic” plants, but many of the most interesting ones don’t grow well in my climate zone (which, of course, is part of what makes them exotic.) Around 15 years back I looked into arum species that could handle my conditions. The famous “corpse flower” Amorphophallus titanium wasn’t an option, both because it is tropical and because it wasn’t available on the consumer market at the time (but is available now) so I bought corms from several other arum species. I treated them as was suggested, planting the corms in the ground each spring and digging them up and “dry storing” them over winter, and soon found that they were very prone to rot given the slightest nick to the corm, and within maybe 3 years all of them were dead. Until a few years later I discovered in my yard a leaf of what was obviously an arum growing in the spot in my yard where I used to plant some–apparently a small piece of corm had broke off one that I had dug up, managed to survive, and grown into a new plant.
I carefully dug that plant up and moved it to a better spot where I left it in the ground (not digging up the corm in winter.) At that time, the corm was around the size of a quarter. A couple of years after that, I decided to move the plant to a large container–by then the corm was around the size of a tennis ball. 3 or 4 years ago it produced its first flower*. The Amorphophallus titanium that are shown on TV and websites every year have a flower that is around 9 feet tall and massive. The flower of my surviving species–Amorphophallus konjaci–grew “only” around 40 inches. While it doesn’t have the massive impressiveness of A. titanium, it does have the other features–a red, glossy leaf that resemble a slab of muscle, white flowers that resemble maggots, and yes, it smells exactly like a dead animal. (All tuned to attract flies, beetles, wasps and such to pollinate them.)
When the flower dies back and in years when there is no flower, arum produce a single, multi-branched leaf on top of a tall stem. My largest leaves are around 4 feet tall and 3 feet across. Over the last few years the corm has spread out roots and produced new corms throughout the container–last year there were at least 20 leaves ranging from tiny to 4-footers, each representing a corm underneath and forming a canopy completely covering the container and beyond. And this year is the first year of flowering since the first time, and this time there are 3 flowers (the largest around 40 inches tall.) The male and female flowers on the infloresence aren’t “active” at the same time–the females stop being receptive to pollen before the males start producing it–to prevent self-pollinization, but the 3 infloresences matured at different times so there is a chance I may get some seeds produced this time.
Note the meaty leaf, the maggoty flowers, and pollinaty insects.
I don’t have access at the moment to my earlier photos over the years, so here are other examples on the web.
As much as I’m impressed by the growth of my plants from a leftover chunk of root, there is still years to go before I reach maximum flower size. Check out these large A. konjac flowers. And there is a lot more room for growth for the corms, too. Such as this pile. (He has that pile because Amorphophallus konjac is decidedly less exotic in parts of Asia, where it is grown as a food crop.)
(As an aside, you’ve all probably seen plenty of Amorphophallus titanium flower photos on the news, but the leaf is also pretty damn impressive. Yes, that whole thing is one leaf, and as with the flower it puts A. konjac to shame.)
(*technically an inflorescence, but I’m using “flower.”)
