Advertisement

SKIP ADVERTISEMENT

New York Today

New York Today: Where the Corpse Flowers Bloom

Be thankful this photo isn’t a scratch and sniff.Credit...Marian Carrasquero/The New York Times

Good morning on this stormy Thursday.

Yesterday, we stopped and smelled a corpse flower.

An Amorphophallus titanum is currently blooming at the New York Botanical Garden in the Bronx, so we joined the crowd of New Yorkers lining up to sniff the crimson plant.

Rancid and sour is how we’d describe it — dead fish also came to mind. After about five minutes of breathing the same air as the plant, we needed a break. Our stomach started to turn.

(The corpse flower began blooming Tuesday evening, and the smell lasts about 24 to 36 hours. If you want to get a whiff, the botanical garden advises that you go as soon as possible — so this morning.)

A blooming corpse flower in North America is a rare sight. It can take a decade or more for the temperamental flower, accustomed to the hot and steamy jungles of Sumatra, to bloom.

And yet, this is the second flowering plant of its kind in the city since 2016. Both have emerged from the New York Botanical Garden’s Nolen Greenhouses, a network of closed-to-the-public greenhouses where a small batch of corpse flowers is coddled and cultivated along with the 100,000 other plants — like Japanese chrysanthemums, oil ferns and night-blooming cactuses — that are planted in the garden’s grounds and exhibitions each year.

Ten immature corpse flowers arrived at the Nolen Greenhouses a decade ago from a specialty nursery in Florida, and now the seven surviving mature plants are beginning to bloom for the first time.

And when they do, the clock starts ticking.

“It’s like a relay race,” said Marc Hachadourian, the director of the Nolen Greenhouses.

With so few active plants, there is a limited amount of pollen, so botanical gardens across the nation share theirs with one another when a flower opens. Pollen packets from the plant currently in bloom in the Bronx were sent to gardens in San Diego, Chicago and Buffalo via FedEx, Mr. Hachadourian said.

“When one blooms, we all congratulate each other, like it’s a birth announcement,” he added. “Where’s a picture of yours? Oh, it’s so beautiful!”

Image
Marc Hachadourian in the Nolen Greenhouses.Credit...Marian Carrasquero/The New York Times

The New York Botanical Garden is willing to put so much time and energy into the corpse flowers because they are educational, interesting and fun, Mr. Hachadourian said, as well as a big draw for visitors.

“They have universal appeal,” Mr. Hachadourian said. “There’s the interesting science and biology behind it. And there’s the gross-out factor, or the haunted house factor. People either want to hug the plant or run out screaming.”

Here’s what else is happening:

Prepare for a whiff of foul weather.

There’s a very good chance that we’ll see showers and thunderstorms this morning, but with sweaty temperatures on tap.

The high today is 84.

The heat is expected to build over the next few days and to reach temperatures that feel like 95 degrees or more during the weekend.

Hundreds gathered for the funeral of Lesandro Guzman-Feliz, the 15-year-old who died after a fatal stabbing in the Bronx that was captured on video and shared across social media. [New York Times]

Image
Mourners leaving Our Lady of Mount Carmel in the Bronx on Wednesday at the funeral of Lesandro Guzman-Feliz.Credit...Demetrius Freeman for The New York Times

A new report has found that low-income New Yorkers, especially in Brooklyn and the Bronx, are affected more deeply by delayed subway trains. [New York Times]

Immigrants in detention facilities will have their hearings conducted via video, after the authorities said protests outside the court had made the situation unsafe. [New York Times]

Joseph Crowley lost his seat in the 14th Congressional District. How did it happen? [New York Times]

After a stunning primary victory over the incumbent, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez emerged as a political star. [New York Times]

The young and energetic Ms. Ocasio-Cortez ousted the incumbent in her district in the Democratic primary. What could this mean for Cynthia Nixon? [New York Times]

Image
If Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez defeats her Republican opponent in November, she, at 28, would be the youngest woman ever elected to Congress.Credit...Annie Tritt for The New York Times

A former New York City detective lied to a grand jury. Now she’s going to jail for 60 days. [New York Times]

A class-action suit against the city argues that intersections in New York City lack proper technology to assist the visually impaired. [New York Times]

In a split decision that could have a chilling effect on journalists, a New York State court ruled that a Times reporter must testify in a trial that she covered. [New York Times]

Landowners surrounding the lush Gramercy Park pay just as much property tax as their neighbors. But only some of them have keys to the park. [Gothamist]

Complaints have been rolling in about a lack of lifeguards for sections of the beach at Coney Island. [Bklyner]

Repairs to the No. 7 train are set to begin next month. [Queens Tribune]

Today’s Metropolitan Diary: “At 74th and West End

For a global look at what’s happening, see Your Morning Briefing.

Enjoy a lunchtime R&B concert at the MetroTech Center in Downtown Brooklyn. Noon. [Free]

Nearly 40 artists display their work at the exhibition “Out of Control” at the Venus Over Manhattan Gallery on the Upper East Side. 6 p.m. [Free]

Live at the Archway presents an evening of Afro-Colombian music, art and a D.J. set under the Manhattan Bridge archway in Dumbo, Brooklyn. 6 p.m. [Free]

Poets House Showcase features an exhibition and readings of new poetry at Poets House in Battery Park in Lower Manhattan. 7 p.m. [Free]

An outdoor screening of “Star Wars: The Last Jedi” at Beach 17th Street and Seagirt Boulevard in Rockaway Beach in Queens. 8 p.m. [Free]

Today in the World Cup: Senegal against Colombia, 10 a.m.; Japan against Poland, 10 a.m.; England against Belgium, 2 p.m.; Panama against Tunisia, 2 p.m.

Alternate-side parking remains in effect until July 4.

For more events, see The New York Times’s Arts & Entertainment guide.

Image
Anyone here a spell-fighter?Credit...Dolly Faibyshev for The New York Times

For those among us skilled in orthography, the Bryant Park Spelling Bee is today in Midtown.

The competition takes place from 7 to 9 p.m. and is an adult version of the Scripps National Spelling Bee (because of the minimum age of participants — 18 — not the nature of the words).

Reading about the competition, we realized that we wouldn’t be able to use the word “bee” in a sentence. What does “bee” actually mean?

Well, before they were “bees,” spelling competitions were known as “spelling-fights,” “spelling combat” and “spelldowns.”

But a “bee” is an old word for a get-together among friends and neighbors who participated in the same activity — like barn raising, logging or husking.

That “bee,” by the way, does not come from the insect, even if that association makes perfect sense. The “bee” in “spelling bee” comes from the Middle English word “bene,” which means “voluntary help given by neighbors toward the accomplishment of a particular task.”

Enough word trivia, there’s plenty of that tonight. Good luck to our city’s spellers!

New York Today is a morning roundup that is published weekdays at 6 a.m. If you don’t get it in your inbox already, you can sign up to receive it by email here.

For New York Today updates throughout the day, like us on Facebook.

What would you like to see here to start your day? Post a comment, email us at nytoday@nytimes.com, or reach us via Twitter using #NYToday.

Follow the New York Today columnists, Alexandra S. Levine and Jonathan Wolfe, on Twitter.

You can find the latest New York Today at nytoday.com.

Advertisement

SKIP ADVERTISEMENT