Amorphophallus titanum

Mission accomplished: Miss K's drum exam went OK and we had time to walk over to the Botanics to see the amorphophallus titanum (titan arum). 

It is the biggest flower in the world: at 13:00 yesterday it was 196.5cm, having grown 14.5cm in the previous 24 hours, so it was sure to be over 2m tall when this was taken. [Update: 2.08m tall at 13:00 today] It's a fascinating plant: most years it comes up as a spike which becomes a "leaf" which looks like a small tree (see extra) but sometimes the spike contains a flower. When it "blooms" [next week?] it releases a stench of rotting flesh to attract carrion insects to pollinate it. Hence #NewReekie

With time pressing, I did feel a bit like the tourist who goes to the Louvre just to see the Mona Lisa, but we did look at some of the other glasshouses where there were some very pretty water lilies (see extra).