When you think of livestreaming, if indeed you reflect on it at all, you probably imagine a gamer screaming about shooting the final boss. Or a conspiracy influencer âjust asking questionsâ about why aliens are running Parliament. It is all very loud, with lots of gifs and sound effects. And yet the so far this year was quite the opposite: it was three weeks of round-the-clock video of a flower slowly growing at , in a town called Boring in Oregon.
This was no ordinary flower. Former web designer Derek Powazek has run the farm for the past decade and is one of the few people on the planet to grow an Amorphophallus titanum in his personal greenhouse. Known colloquially as a corpse flower, A. titanum produces the worldâs largest bloom. âI have never smelled a human decaying, but Iâm pretty sure it smells like that,â Powazek told me by video from his greenhouse, where he was sitting next to the flower he dubbed Fred. âIt was a wall of stench.â
Normally these plants only grow in the wilds of Sumatra, Indonesia, where they are fertilised by carrion beetles that are drawn to the stink, the way bees are drawn to flowers. Only a few have been cultivated, mostly at universities and fancy botanical gardens.
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I started watching the livestream in mid-July, when the reached Powazekâs waist. It grew several centimetres every day and looked like a slender, green missile wrapped in a massive, purple-edged chard leaf. By skipping backwards and forwards on the livestream, it was easy to see how much it grew in mere hours. I am no stranger to wildlife webcams â I have followed the melodrama of a local peregrine falcon nest for years â but this was something different. Watching a plant grow changed the entire tempo of my day. Instead of focusing on deadlines and minute-by-minute news updates, I slipped into plant time, measured by the slant of light through the greenhouse walls.
Powazek planted his A. titanum 13 years ago using a seed given to him by a University of Missouri botanist. Fred sprouted while Powazek was still in a cramped San Francisco apartment and he worried what would happen if it flowered. Where would he put a 1.5-metre-tall flower that reeked of death? Luckily, it rarely blooms, with most growth cycles producing only a single leaf that looks like a small tree.
I have never smelled a human decaying, but Iâm pretty sure the corpse flower smells like that. It was a wall of stench
In the meantime, Powazek quit his tech job. He and his wife, Heather Champ, moved to Milk Barn Farm, where they learned to rear goats, chickens and turkeys, and grow legal cannabis for CBD oil. Champ still works remotely for a tech firm, while Powazek tends the farm. Fred took up residence in the greenhouse Powazek built for their orchids and other tropical plants.
When Fred bloomed in late July, I watched its leafy wrapper flare open like a skirt, forming what is called a spathe around the missile-shaped spadix. It was as tall as an adult human, and ready to meet the neighbours. Dozens of locals came to admire Fred, some gagging at the smell while others took excited selfies, and hundreds more watched online.
Powazek fertilised Fred on the livestream too, using pollen from with a livestream, at Washington State University in Vancouver, Washington. Biology instructor Dawn Freeman told him to cut a âwindowâ in the thick base of Fredâs spathe. Next, he used a tiny paintbrush to reach inside and daub pollen on Fredâs female flowers. As he worked, people on Powazekâs TikTok begged him not to hurt the plant. âThey wanted me to use flies to deliver the pollen â how would I have gotten pollen on the flies?â He smiled. âPeople got really emotionally involved.â Fred took it all quite cheerfully, however, and we of the tiny pink-and-gold blooms hidden inside.
What is it about extremely slow plant action that we find so emotionally riveting? Powazek thinks it is an escape from a world that feels out of control. âWhen youâre gardening and your hands are dirty, you canât use your phone,â he said. âYou have to be where you are, giving your love and attention to a thing that is beautiful and isnât going to yell at you on social media.â
Still, he did use technology to invite others into his greenhouse. âWe forget that social media solves a real problem, which is that we are social creatures and we want to talk to each other. It enabled me to reach out to people and say, âLook at this cool thingâ. â Powazek paused and looked up at the deep-green structure towering over his head. âThe way weâve built social media brings out our worst selves. It turns everyone into advertisers, looking for attention or money. But it doesnât have to be that way.â
More and more people seem to agree with him. I would certainly rather watch a giant, stinky plant grow than talk to an AI chatbot.
Annaleeâs week
What Iâm reading
The Light Eaters by Zoë Schlanger, about the complex lives of plants.
What Iâm watching
Weird alternate history series My Lady Jane, where Lady Jane Grey marries a magical horse.
What Iâm working on
Growing wildflowers in my garden.
Annalee Newitz is a science journalist and author. Their latest book is Stories Are Weapons: Psychological warfare and the American mind. They are the co-host of the Hugo-winning podcast Our Opinions Are Correct. You can follow them @annaleen and their website is techsploitation.com
