Thailand’s largest flower and one of the World’s rarest and most usual plants

Rafflesia is a parasitic plant with no roots or leaves of its own. it invades lianas of the genus Tesvastigma(Vitaceae) and, like a fungus, it adsorbs all of its nutrients from its host. Once a year small flower buds begin to develop beneath the root bark of the woody liana. As they mature the buds break through the root and swell to the size of soccer ball. The flower blooms in a spectacular display of color (ochre, yellow, chestnut and white), and enormous size (up to 80 cm in diameter).

Pollination

The flower emits a sickly sweet smell, a bit like rotting carcass, which attracts files for pollination. A female flower must be pollination by a male flower, no simple task considering how rare and wildly spaced the blooms may be. To further compound reproduction problems, rafflesia only blooms for 3-4 days, then turns black and shrivels away like a rotting muchroom. 

No one is yet totally certain how seeds are dispersed to infect a new host liana, but botanists do know that the plant is restricted to the Sundaic region of Southeast Asia, and that it is endangered and easily damaged or destroyed.