Not a Macro

Gallery: FloraPosted January 30, 2016149 views5 comments

My wife spotted this flower under some bushes on the edge of the road into Kaena Point on Oahu. Some research revealed that it's a South African succulent escaped from cultivation. It's Stapelia gigantea, common names are Carrion flower, Star flower, and Toad flower. It's one of those that smells like rotting flesh to attract flies as pollinators. Considered an invasive in Hawaii, it doesn't seem to be very agressive from the discussion I saw of it. The gigantea portion of the name is from the flower that can reach a diameter of 16 inches (40 cm) This one didn't look much more than 6 or 7, but I didn't try extending the petals.

5D3, 28-70 f2.8L @ 65 mm, hand held, f/10, 1/40 sec, iso 1600, aperture priority, pattern metering. Processed in LR5 & CS6. Cropped to a 4x5 aspect ratio with a bit extra off the top for composition. Final size was 14.6 MP before resizing for web presentation.

Comments and criticisms are appreciated.

Thanks,

Comments

5 comments

Comment posted by Philip Hodgkins on January 30, 2016 at 8:00 PM

I watched a video of this on YouTube, The flies were having a field day on this and the flower was acrawl with larvae. Why on earth would anyone want to cultivate something that smells like dead bodies and breeds flies? Yeccchh! This is a bit confusing in that the leaves in the LLC are not a part of the plant. The spiky standing thingys are. frown

Registered on July 24, 2006, 2741 Posts, 12349 Comments

Comment posted by scott lanz on January 30, 2016 at 8:35 PM

Nice find and photo of an amazing flower, Dennis.

Registered on November 14, 2003, 840 Posts, 12902 Comments

Comment posted by Bill Fach on January 30, 2016 at 11:05 PM

Dennis: Nice find and image of a very unique flower. I go back and forth on cropping some off the right side but the more I look the more I like it as is. 2 thumbs up. >=))>

Registered on November 1, 2003, 1805 Posts, 26981 Comments

Comment posted by Nathan Buck on January 31, 2016 at 2:08 AM

Interesting bloom and a nice photo of it Dennis. Thanks for sharing the view (but not the stink cool

).

Nathan

Registered on November 1, 2003, 1101 Posts, 13589 Comments

Comment posted by Giuseppe Guadagno on February 1, 2016 at 5:41 PM

Very interesting flower that I have seen only in the greenhouse in a pot. Thanks for sharing.

Registered on February 3, 2007, 827 Posts, 5052 Comments