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  Good bulbifer, Bad bulbifer
From: Don Martinson <LLmen at wi.rr.com> on 2007.07.04 at 16:27:13(15939)
Title: Good bulbifer, Bad bulbifer

I’m surprised no one found this quote from Deni Bown’s Aroids, Chapter 2, page 54:

Sometimes even the same inflorescence presents contrasting scents. One botanist discovered that, after cutting away the enveloping lower spath of a Biarum inflorescence, “the admittedly pungent aroma of the black terminal appendix turns unexpectedly into a sweet, gentle fragrance when the bolder nose investigates the more basal regions of the spadix” (Mayo 1980).

Don Martinson

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From: "AbrimaaL" <abrimaal at wp.pl> on 2007.07.05 at 20:42:29(15943)
Title: Good bulbifer, Bad bulbifer

Hello,

just smell a popular house Spathiphyllum, with big
spathes early in the morning. First the smell is fresh but when you inhale
longer it resembles cheese.

Marek Argent

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From: "Julius Boos" <ju-bo at msn.com> on 2007.07.05 at 21:07:36(15944)
Reply-To : Discussion of aroids
Sent : Wednesday, July 4, 2007 4:27 PM
To : aroid-l
Subject : [Aroid-l] Good bulbifer, Bad bulbifer

Dear Don,

Interesting! But here Dr. Mayo is talking about mechanically removing the
spathe, which we must presume was responsible for the 'bad' smell.
Whatever the other scent producing mech. must be (in Biarum), it then
continues to produce a not-unpleasant smell!

My friend, the late Dr. Guang hua Zhu, in his fantastic work on the
Neotropical genus Dracontium, learned that if the spathe was cut off, ALL
sign/hint of ANY type of scent (which usually is pretty foul!) was gone!
There are stomatal-like gladular structures within the spathe of Dracontium
that obviously produce the BAD small!
But in A. bulbifer we are discussing a species in which some plants, with no
disfigurement of the spathes, produce a FOUL small, while other plants
seemingly of the SAME species produce a noticably pleasant smell! The
mystry continues!

Good Growing!

Julius

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