Monday, May 17, 2010

What flowering plant lives 40 years, blooms and then dies?

Possibly tropical plant, # of years questionable. Absolute on bloom

What flowering plant lives 40 years, blooms and then dies?
This may be the Titan "stinking" arum.





On second thought - I double checked and found this one - the Talipot Palm.








Late Bloomer


The flowering of another native plant of southern India (and Sri Lanka), the Talipot palm, is truly a once-in-a-lifetime event—for the tree, at least. The Talipot palm is monocarpic, meaning it blooms only once, and in this case, at the end of its long life, which can last between 30 and 80 years.





While the Talipot palm can grow to enormous heights during its lifetime, as high as 82 feet (25 meters), it becomes even taller when in bloom. It grows a large stalk at its top, between 20 and 26 feet (6–8 meters) long, which produces smaller branches carrying millions of flowers. The stalk, branches, and flowers of the Talipot palm, known jointly as an inflorescence, is the largest of any plant in the world (the Titan Arum lily has the largest unbranched inflorescence).





Once the Talipot palm has flowered, it takes a year for the fruit to develop; it eventually produces thousands of round yellow-green fruit, each of which contains a single seed. After the fruit appears, the Talipot palm dies off.
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