The Titan Arum continued...

There’s been a flurry of Titans flowering this year, with two more coming to my attention since the last post, so I’ve continued with this great plant.

One of them (opened 5 May) was in the basement of Cafe Mavi, Summit, New Jersey. Fortunately, the owner had an exhaust fan running in there as the stench of this giant would surely have ruined his custom! This is his second Titan to flower in the last year and he may have a third coming soon.

The other was also in the US and was due to open around 7 May. Head here for more. It seems that they too will have another Titan flowering very soon, so keep any eye on that link!

Closer to home there has been some discussion on Titans from seed and their propensity to produce multiple shoots as young seedlings. The reasons may vary, but some think it can be damage to the seed or young tuber that may cause it. Either way, one of our 3yr old seedlings has had multiple stems all of its’ young life – not something I expected! When last re-potted (Jan 07, see pic above) it had 12 new shoots coming on and it continued to produce new ones as the old shoots died off. It will be interesting to see how many it continues to produce, as there are now only three strong leaders with a few shorter ones underneath.

The 2kg tuber I wrote about last time still hasn't shown any signs of growth, so I'm holding off repotting until it does. It was from the same batch of seed as the multi-stemmed one above, so I'm keen to see how the multi-stemmed tuber has fared and whether it comes in at a similar weight - I have my doubts on that, but we'll just have to wait and see!

Oh, and another good link to watch regarding Titans is this one, care of Gustavus Adolphus College, Minnesota, USA.

Happy Growing!