It's been about 2 years since I saw the blooming of these flowers. In my memories, I used to see more than one flowers blooming. But this time round, there was only one flower.
I can't recall smelling any fragrance from this flower. Yet, by looking at the ants that crawled around the flower, you can feel how the sweetness and fragrance attracted these little "insects".
Although this flower looks beautiful, the lifespan was very short. It can only last for about 6-8 hours from the moment it started to bloom till withered.
If you do know the name of this flower, please drop me a note.
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| Beginning to bloom |
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| Ants crawling around the flower |
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| Almost fully bloomed |
Love...
ReplyDeleteWhen I was young, I also had heard and came across this type of flowers before....
Well, searching thru' the internet for the name of this flower....
"昙花一现" ~ Chinese Name
"Queen of the Night" ~ English Name
"Epiphyllum oxypetalum" ~ Actual Name
"昙花" refers to Epiphyllum oxypetalum, a lovely flower which only blooms at night, thus giving it its common name, Queen of the Night.
Details of the flower :
The epiphyllum is actually a cactus, supposedly originated from the deserts in Central and South America. As the deserts are very hot and dry in the day, it is believed that the epiphyllum blooms at night as it is cooler and will reduce water loss. There are, however, some species of epiphyllums that bloom in the day, especially the hybrids which produce brightly coloured flowers.
Lots of tiny insects were attracted by the sweet smell, and many had gathered within the flower. These were the potential pollinators that might carry the pollens to other blossoming epiphyllum.
Details & names of this flower, is from this blogger's blog : http://tidechaser.blogspot.com/2007/09/queen-of-night.html
wow... I've learnt quite alot of this flower now... BUT they are very "short-life"...
You can learnt more from this website : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epiphyllum_oxypetalum
hee.... hope this helps... :D