Dragon Arum

This is one of the most named plants around: Dracunculus vulgaris (also known as Arum dracunculus) is also known as the Dragon Arum, the Voodoo Lily, Ragons, the Snake Lily, the Black Arum, the Black Dragon, Dragonwort, and Stink Lily. In its native Greece it is called Drakondia, which makes sense when you consider the long spadex can be viewed as a hiding dragon or serpent, lurking in the maroon-lipped spathe.

Originally the plant was found in the Balkans, and right down to Greece, Crete and the Aegean Islands, all the way to Southwest Turkey.

What does it look like? Well, the very odd and impressive deep purple-black spadex strikes upward in a shimmering purple-black lance which has been known to reach fifty inches, though a more commonplace height is around twelve inches. This black spadex extends from the spathe a hooded flower in a lush pink colour. The leaves are pointed, heavily veined and very pretty in their own right.

While the plant is beautiful in and of itself (if rather shockingly like the kind of man eating plant that featured in rather dodgy films of the fifties) that’s not the weird thing about it. Nope, to survive, the Dragon Arum needs to attract carrion-eating pollinators, which means that in the breeding season it will smell of rotten meat for a few days. However, it doesn’t eat the insects, it just inveigles them in, and uses them to transfer pollen. It’s a certain fact though, that you wouldn’t want to grow them too close to the house.

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