At the Chicago Botanic Garden, a corpse flower named "Spike" was not opening properly on its own, but was able to with some assistance.
According to CBS Chicago, this was an unnatural way for the flower to bloom and it was previously a bad sign for the famously smelly plant. Patrick Herendeen, a research scientist at the garden, said something went wrong along the way for Spike.
"We could smell a bit of odor in the morning the last several days but the odor today was much less than what it was a couple days ago so based on that it seems like it was past its prime," Herendeen told CBS Chicago.
Herendeen also narrated the opening, which required assistance from garden personnel in cutting away exterior petals.
"It's disappointing that it didn't open because it's really quite splendid," he said, according to The Chicago Tribune. "They're amazing plants. Their flowers are amazing and their odor is amazing. However, this is not unprecedented. It just didn't perform as expected. But that's just like our garden plants at home."
Corpse flowers are known for their putrid smell upon blooming, which has become an event in itself. Corpse flowers typically bloom in cycles and sometimes they can produce duds. For example, Spike is expected to restarts its cycle and could bloom again in about three years.
Denver's Botanic Garden recently experienced a corpse flower bloom, which attracted some 22,000 paid visitors over a two-day stretch. About 57,000 people came to see Spike when it was preparing to bloom.
"It's a great story," Tim Pollack, the floriculturist who tended to Spike, told CBS Chicago. "We're overwhelmed."
