Australia holds its nose for its 3rd rancid bloom of a rare corpse plant in 3 months

MELBOURNE, Australia (AP) — A rare bloom with a pungent odor like decaying flesh has opened in the Australian capital in the nation’s third such extraordinary flowering in as many months.

The corpse flower, also known by its scientific name amorphophallus titanium, bloomed for the first time in its 15 years at Canberra’s Australian National Botanic Gardens on Saturday and was closing on Monday, staff said.

Another flowered briefly in the Sydney Royal Botanic Gardens in late January, attracting 20,000 admirers. Similar numbers turned out to experience another rancid bloom at the Geelong Botanic Gardens southwest of Melbourne in November.

The corpse flower or corpse plant, known as bunga bangkai in its native Indonesia, is endemic to the rainforests of western Sumatra.

It only blooms for a few days every 7 to 10 years in its natural habitat. Its rancid scent attracts pollinators such as flies.

There are thought to be only 300 of the plants in the wild and fewer than 1,000 including those in cultivation.

Canberra’s acting nursery manager Carol Dale said there was no clear explanation for Australia’s spate of putrid blooms.

A flower is produced when the plant has stored enough energy in its underground tuber known as a corm.

“One of the theories is that a lot of these plants are of a similar age, so they have just stored up enough carbohydrates in the corm to finally produce a flower,” Dale said.

“All of the plants around Australia are held in different conditions, so it’s unusual that they’re all flowering at the same time.” she added.

She said Canberra, Sydney and Geelong had different climates. Gardeners used different fertilizing regimes on each plant and different management plans.

Dale said that after 15 years without a bloom, she had decided that Canberra, which occasionally receives snowfall, was not the place for a corpse plant to thrive.

“It’s been in our collection for slightly longer than these plants would normally take to flower for the first time, so we just didn’t think we had the right conditions here in Canberra,” Dale said.

“So yes, it did catch us by surprise; a very pleasant one,” she added.

The flower began opening around lunchtime on Saturday and its rancid odor quickly deteriorated.

“By Saturday evening, it was incredibly pungent. We could smell it from across the road. It was definitely gag worthy,” Dale said.

The crowds attracted to the 135-centimeter (53-inch) tall flower were limited to the hundreds by a ticketing system due to space constraints within the greenhouse.

Admirers likened the stench to a range of dead animals, rotten eggs, sweaty socks, sewage and garbage.

Dale said the worst had passed by Monday.

“We collected pollen about an hour ago and when you’re right up close to the plant, it’s still got that rotting flesh smell,” she said.

A corpse flower begins to bloom at the Royal Botanical Gardens in Sydney, Australia, Jan. 23, 2025, before another has opened in the Australian capital Canberra in the nation's third such unusual flowering in recent months. (AP Photo/Rick Rycroft)

People gather around a corpse flower that begins to bloom at the Royal Botanical Gardens in Sydney, Australia, Jan. 23, 2025, before another has opened in the Australian capital Canberra in the nation's third such unusual flowering in recent months. (AP Photo/Rick Rycroft)

Exxon Mobil’s first quarter profit slumped to the lowest level in years, stung by weaker crude prices and higher costs.

The oil and gas giant earned $7.71 billion, or $1.76 per share, for the three months ended March 31. It earned $8.22 billion, or $2.06 per share, in the year-ago period.

The results topped Wall Street expectations, but Exxon does not adjust its reported results based on one-time events such as asset sales. Analysts polled by Zacks Investment Research expected earnings of $1.74 per share.

Revenue totaled $83.13 billion, which fell short of the $84.15 billion that analysts were calling for.

This week, a barrel of U.S. benchmark crude fell below $60, a level at which many producers can no longer turn a profit.

“In this uncertain market, our shareholders can be confident in knowing that we’re built for this,” Chairman and CEO Darren Woods said in a statement Friday. “The work we’ve done to transform our company over the past eight years positions us to excel in any environment.”

Crude oil is down nearly 18% for the year to date, according to FactSet.

Oil prices plummeted last month, at one point sinking to a four-year low in anticipation of slowing economic growth due to a burgeoning trade war.

Trump announced far-reaching tariffs on nearly all U.S. trading partners April 2 and then reversed himself a few days later after a market meltdown, suspending the import taxes for 90 days. Amid the uncertainty for both U.S. consumers and businesses, the Commerce Department said Wednesday that the U.S. economy shrank 0.3% from January through March, the first drop in three years.

Rapidly falling oil prices signal pessimism about economic growth and can be a harbinger of a recession as manufacturers cut production, businesses cut travel costs and families rethink vacation plans.

And there appears to be little appetite for turn off the spigots by some of the world's largest producers.

In December eight members of the OPEC+ alliance of oil exporting countries signaled they would not cut production as they compete with production from non-allied oil producing countries.

The OPEC+ members decided at the time to postpone production increases that had been scheduled to take effect Jan. 1. The plan had been to start gradually restoring 2.2 million barrels per day over the course of 2025.

That process was pushed back to April 1 and production increases will gradually take place over 18 months until October 2026.

Shares of Exxon Mobil rose slightly before the market open.

FILE - Oil pumps work in the desert oil fields of Sakhir, Bahrain, Sept. 30, 2015. (AP Photo/Hasan Jamali, File)