Crowds flock to smell blooming corpse flower in the Bronx

NEW YORK (FOX5NY.COM) - A stench in the Bronx is drawing crowds from all over the world.

For 36 hours, a flower that smells like rotting flesh is the talk of the town. The Amorphophallus titanum—or corpse flower—has only bloomed at the New York Botanical Garden four times since the 1930s. One of those rare occurrences happens to be this week.

The New York Botanical Garden's Marc Hachadourian calls himself the corpse flower keeper. He can tell you everything you've ever wanted to know about one of the world's largest and coolest plants. He says the corpse flower has become a pop culture phenomenon.

The garden has seven plants near maturity. They weren't expected to bloom this year. But much to Marc's surprise, it happened. So the garden set up a webcam so horticulturists from around the world could watch it bloom. 

Watching people waiting around to smell a flower is the strangest thing. But for many, this is a once-in-a-lifetime event. And so, we wait and we wait and we wait. And then we smelled it—rotting meat.

And by the way, that rotting smell is not a coincidence. Marc explains that the flower smells so bad because it has been pollinated by flies and beetles that feed on rotting flesh.

The brief moment in time lasts no more than two days. But that moment will stay with these folks forever—in their noses and their phones.