From: "Albert Huntington" amh at ieee.org> on 2003.06.04 at 16:45:34(10313)
Hi Nancy,
I'm probably going to end up repeating information already
provided by others, but here goes...
Inflorescence ( not to be confused with fluorescence ) is a
technical term for something us non-botanists would usually just
call a flower. In an aroid, it typically means the spathe and the
spadix including all the little tiny male and female flowers
attached to the spadix.
If one wants to get all technical-like, the largest
inflorescence probably belongs to the Talipot palm, Corypha
umbraculifera - but it doesn't look like just one flower to us non
technical people - it looks like a cluster of flowers - a 30 foot
tall cluster of flowers. There are also some agave and bromeliad
species which produce pretty large inflorescences.
The largest single flower is likely Rafflesia arnoldii, a
parasitic plant that grows in southeast asia. It gets about 3
feet wide. So far, nobody has been able to grow this one in
captivity successfully.
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