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That Smell: Twin 'Corpse Flowers' Near To Blooming

(CBS) -- The smell is back, and this time there are two of them.

The Chicago Botanic Garden is getting ready for rare twin corpse flowers to bloom.

As CBS 2's Charlie De Mar explains, the awful smell is actually what draws people to them.

Bright, beautiful exotic flowers fill the Botanic Garden in the north suburbs. Right now, the excitement is over these two towering rare flowers.

They are called amorphophallus titanum, but they are more commonly known as "corpse flowers."

The "Titan Twins" Java and Sumatra are named after the Indonesian islands where they're natively found.

While there's no firm date on when the twins will bloom, the only guarantee is the awful smell they are known for. It's been described as anything from a hog farm, to dirty socks to dead fish.

The scent is meant to attract flesh-eating insects that help pollinate.

They have become so popular, a live stream keeps watch for people who want to know when they'll be ripest.

Outdoor floricultursit Tim Pollak says the garden's first coprse flower, Spike, never opened in 2015. But two others have bloomed since.

The twin corpse flowers are expected to bloom anywhere from a week, at the earliest, to about 14 days from now. The flowers will remain in bloom for only about a day or two.

For more information, click here.

 

 

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