How foul-smelling is the world's smelliest flower? A roundup of stinky flower varieties

Generally speaking, flowers win fans with their outstanding looks or their innate fragrance. However, where there is fragrance in this world, there is also stench, and it turns out that some flowers attract insects for pollination by giving off a foul smell. Below is a roundup of the world's smelliest flowers.

Titan arum

The titan arum is a herbaceous plant with an enormous flower, also known as the corpse flower or giant taro; its blooming period is short, and when in full bloom it gives off a rotten stench, smelling like a corpse or dirty socks, making it the undisputed king of stench among flowers.

Rafflesia

Rafflesia is a parasitic plant; it can only bloom for four days in total, and it blooms only once in its lifetime. When its bud first opens it has a pleasant, faint scent, but after it opens it gives off a sickening putrid odor, which is why it is also known as the corpse flower.

African hyacinth

The African hyacinth is native to southern Africa and is one of the world's famous "stink flowers"; it mainly emits a corpse-like stench to attract carrion beetles and dung beetles to help pollinate it.

Western skunk cabbage

Western skunk cabbage grows mainly along rivers and in damp areas of the Pacific Northwest of the United States, and especially likes to grow in swamps and moist soil; its hallmark is that its whole body carries a foul odor, and even after it is later made into a specimen, the smell that permeates its entire body can still be detected.

Starfish flower

The starfish flower, also known as the carrion flower, has a very large bloom after flowering, opening in five lobes and looking extremely like a starfish; the flower color is pale yellow with light blackish-purple transverse bands. Its flowering season is generally in autumn, and after the flower opens it uses its extremely foul smell to attract flies for pollination.

Eastern skunk cabbage

Eastern skunk cabbage is a plant of the genus Symplocarpus in the family Araceae; its leaves are all non-toxic and harmless, but if you tear the leaves of eastern skunk cabbage, it will give off a stomach-turning skunk stench.

Dragon arum

The dragon arum's flower is somewhat like an antique; its flower color is deep purple, and its stem resembles a dragon or venomous snake coiled inside the spathe. The flower is leaf-shaped, and after it blooms it gives off a rotting smell, incredibly foul.

Giant Dutchman's pipe

The giant Dutchman's pipe gives off a smell like a dead rat after flowering; in the jungle, the principle is that it wants to use the smell to lure large predatory animals to take the bait and help it achieve pollination.