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October 30, 2009 : Tacca chantrieri
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Plant Family / Families: Taccaceae
Scientific Name and Author: Tacca chantrieri André
Institution: Royal Botanic Gardens & Domain, Sydney
Name Location: Sydney, New South Wales, Australia
Lindsay is again the author of today's entry:
Thank you to Brent Miller aka foliosus@Flickr who submitted today's photograph and inspired today's Hallowe'en entry (original image | Botany Photo of the Day Flickr Pool)!.
Historically, Hallowe'en is thought to have its origins in Samhain, a Celtic festival marking the end of the "lighter half" & the beginning of the "darker half" in the Gaulish calendar. What better to mark the arrival of the "darker half" of the year than this haunting beauty, Tacca chantrieri. Native to southeast Asia, Tacca chantrieri carries the mischievous common names of bat or devil flower. Bat flower is a reference to the dark bracts with prominent venation, while devil flower refers to the filaments that can grow to 70cm, terminating in a "forked tail".
A menacing reputation follows this captivating, and somewhat unsettling, flower. Some people believe that the strange "eyes" appear to follow you around the room. Superstitions in southeast Asia include a belief that it is unlucky to look into the eyes of Tacca chantrieri and / or a belief that it brings death close to oneself and one's family.
For more photographs, see Tacca chantrieri at the Wikimedia Commons.
Daniel adds: I wanted to let you know that the garden's web site will be unavailable on Monday, November 2 beginning at ~9am PST. We are upgrading the server. I hope the outage is short, but it's impossible to predict what we may need to troubleshoot to get everything up and running again.
Posted by Daniel Mosquin at October 30, 2009 10:58 PM
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Comments
Posted by: elizabeth a airhart at October 31, 2009 4:02 AM
A perfect photo for Hallowe'en. Thanks for searching it out, Brent and to Lindsay for the entry, and to Daniel for posting it.
Posted by: DikDik at October 31, 2009 4:54 AM
Spooky.....
Posted by: Joyce at October 31, 2009 5:48 AM
Thank you Elizabeth for your entry. I enjoy them as much as the photo of the day.
Posted by: Carole Miller at October 31, 2009 7:33 AM
This is one of the highlights of my email reading time of day. Upgrade the servers- take as much time as you need. Just keep the beautiful pictures coming and thanks to every contributor and also to everyone who makes neat comments.
Posted by: sandyinz4 at October 31, 2009 8:11 AM
Very interesting flower! I love the creepiness, too.
Those who enjoy following links, may like this page from a few years ago. The glass pumpkins are really fun.
Posted by: Mary Ann, in Toronto at October 31, 2009 9:14 AM
oops, forgot this part: http://www.ubcbotanicalgarden.org/potd/2006/10/cucurbita_cultivar.php
Posted by: Mary Ann, in Toronto at October 31, 2009 9:15 AM
,___,,
( o,- )
(___(\
-"- "-\|-¸.·´¯`·.¸★
¯`·.¸¸.☆¯`·.¸☆
`·.¸★ What a beautifully spoooky flora species! ·.¸★
Posted by: Elizabeth at October 31, 2009 9:41 AM
Wow! Interesting flower--you can see why it's called "bat flower." It really does look like bats hanging down! What an amazing and wonderful variety of plants our world has. Thanks for showing them to us every day.
Posted by: Janet A. at October 31, 2009 12:39 PM
Great post for Halloween. But Elizabeth, I'm totally out of the loop. I would love to know what you said.
Posted by: Deborah Lievens at October 31, 2009 5:33 PM
This is so good, totally botanically Hallowe'en, I saw the bats straight away when I saw the picture! Just fab!!!
I too love elizabeth a's poetry...keep it forever coming along with BPotD :D Thanks to you all.
Posted by: ingrid at October 31, 2009 6:40 PM
Deborah, is it Elizabeth's pictogram that you're asking about? It took me a while to see it. Perhaps this slightly tweeked version makes it clearer...
,,__,,
( o,o)
(\__(\
-"- "-\|-¸.·´¯`·.¸★
¯`·.¸¸.☆¯`·.¸☆
`·.¸★·.¸★
Posted by: Mary Ann, in Toronto at October 31, 2009 10:28 PM
Thanks, Mary Ann. Now I get it. Cute, Elizabeth. Whoops, I was thinking about a verbal message.
Posted by: Deborah Lievens at November 1, 2009 7:57 AM
Ah, but the second owl isn't winking...
Fabulous flower, and interesting info as usual. Thanks
Posted by: Susan Gustavson at November 3, 2009 9:55 AM
Please share your comments about the photograph(s) and accompanying write-up. Telling a story about the subject of the photograph(s) is also much appreciated! If you have a gardening question, the best place to ask is on the UBC Botanical Garden Forums. Thank you!
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Botany Photo of the Day is a project of the UBC Botanical Garden and Centre for Plant Research, located in Vancouver, British Columbia Canada. UBC BGCPR is a department of the Faculty of Land and Food Systems within The University of British Columbia.
oh the ghosties and goulies are
walking the gardens and pathways
the horse man rides with his head
in his arm jack carries his lantern
trying to find his way after dealing
with the devil and do not step
on any cracks today watch for black cats
and bat flowers BOO to you all