Hold Your Nose! Corpse Flower Hits Peak Bloom at US Botanic Garden

Viewers say corpse flower smells like “a combination of garlic, fish, diapers and rotting meat," US Botanic Garden says in statement

What to Know

  • A corpse flower, named for its odor, started to bloom early Tuesday.
  • The plant's smell is described as "a combination of garlic, fish, diapers and rotting meat."
  • The last time the garden displayed a blooming corpse flower was 2013.

Hold your nose! The corpse flower at the U.S. Botanic Garden (USBG) has finally started to bloom. 

The flower began opening early Tuesday morning, the USBG wrote on its Facebook page.

Viewers have described the plant's smell as "a combination of garlic, fish, diapers and rotting meat," the USBG said in the statement. That stench is expected to peak between 10 a.m. and 2 p.m Tuesday. 

Your nose won't be happy, but your eyes will enjoy the display. The flower, native to Indonesia rain forests and nicknamed "the stinky plant," can grow up to 12 feet tall. Though the purple-green plant looks like one giant bud, it is actually made up of hundreds of tiny (smelly) flowers.

The last time the garden displayed a blooming corpse flower was 2013 -- and it wasn't the one blooming right now. 

Corpse flowers bloom erratically, since it can take anywhere from years to decades for the large plant to get enough energy to bloom. The plant that's stunning us all with its stinkiness is blooming for the first time, at six years old.

Though it normally closes at 5 p.m., USBG will stay open until 11 p.m. during peak bloom.

If you're not interested in getting an up close and personal whiff of the flower, you can check out the livestream above. 

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