The wonderful Voodoo lily fooled me yet again yesterday! I was walking along the sidewalk looking at the garden in the opposite direction and immediatly caught the whiff of decaying flesh. I though, “Oh, God–what died?” and started looking, but when I turned around, there were the amazing floral spathes of Dracunculus, bloody maroon and stinking!
My original bulb came from Jeff Tangen and they have spread out over time and I’ve moved offsets around the garden, but the best ones continue to be in the Douglas fir bed. Somehow, they manage to thrive in that dry shade and “reward” me with corpse flowers every year.
This plant has interest for at least half the year. The leaves are unusual, the flowers magnificent, if short-lived, and the berries that follow add to the show for several more months.
These plants need no care, so I don’t have many plans for them in 2020 other than to remind myself of their existence so I’m not looking for corspes when these flowers are the stink makers.