Amorphophallus titanum Becoming Rare in the Wild

Titan arum, Amorphophallus titanum, is threatened by development in its native Sumatran rain forest habitat. The plant bears the largest cluster of flowers found in nature. Often billed as the world's largest flower, its rare bloom is a popular attraction at botanical gardens. Around 600 gardens now grow the plant outside of Sumatra.

Many of the tubers that were removed from the wild for display at botanical gardens were taken illegally. While residential construction is encroaching on the native rain forest habitat of the titan arum, poaching is still a threat and tougher laws are needed to protect the plants.

Link: Rare flowers disappearing from Sumatran rain forests from The Jakarta Post

Posted by Eric La Fountaine at 3:37 PM on March 29, 2005

Want to talk about this weblog entry? As of August 22, 2006, all new entries and most older entries are cross-posted to the UBC Botanical Garden Discussion Forums for discussion (you might need to use the search function to find the thread you are looking for).

This is an effort to reduce the amount of time spent dealing with spam (the forums are very good at stopping spam, the weblog commenting system is not so good).

Older entries already containing comments remain open for discussion.