Smell you later, Horace.
The Como Park Zoo and Conservatory announced Friday morning that its suddenly famous corpse flower “has finished blooming, and the smell has faded.”
The odoriferous plant, nicknamed Horace by conservatory staff, remained on public display through the day.
“We’ll be moving him back behind the scenes at the end of today (Friday), where he’ll rest until the next bloom, likely years from now,” Como managers said in a morning online update.
A YouTube livestream of Horace also ended Friday night after the line was cut off at 4 p.m. and the last visitor departed the St. Paul conservatory, which officially closed at 6 p.m.
On Thursday, the bloom drew thousands of visitors to the Marjorie McNeely Conservatory, with visitors waiting up to four hours for a chance to see — and sniff — Horace.
By the end of the day, attendance topped 20,000, according to Como Zoo and Conservatory spokesman Matt Reinartz. A typical Thursday before Memorial Day weekend sees 4,600, he said.
Conservatory staff accommodated everyone who was in line at 4 p.m. Thursday, with the last visitors exiting at 8 p.m.
Attendance as of noon Friday appeared to be about the same as Thursday, Reinartz said.
In the end, Horace never fully unfurled its spathe (the ruffled maroon leaf surrounding the spadix, or fleshy central spike). Staff said that was likely a consequence of Horace’s youth and nighttime lighting inside the conservatory.
Viewers of the Friday livestream might have noticed that a trapezoidal window had been cut into Horace’s base.
The conservatory said that was done to allow access for insects and to offer a glimpse of the plant’s male/female reproductive structures. Staff did not pollinate Horace from another specimen or collect any of Horace’s pollen through the window because there isn’t a pressing need to propagate Horace’s genetic line. Also, Como doesn’t have space to grow more seedlings.
Read below for Thursday’s coverage of Horace
Following more than two weeks of anticipation, visitors lined up on Thursday to witness Horace, the giant corpse flower, finally start to unfurl his malodorous bloom at the Marjorie McNeely Conservatory at Como Park in St. Paul.
The crowds might have been drawn by an update posted to the Como Zoo and Conservatory’s social media on Thursday morning.
“Horace made progress overnight,” Como Zoo posted on X. “PEEUUUUUUUUUU. He’s starting to stink up the North Garden!”
The bloom definitely has an odor, visitors reported, drawing buzzing insects as well as people.
“It’s very pungent right now but not too bad,” said Skye McGregor of Minneapolis, referring to the flower’s infamous smell when she stopped by on Wednesday.
The plant’s livestream feed can be viewed round-the-clock on YouTube. On Thursday, the people-watching struck some observers as just as fun as visitors waved and reacted to the camera almost as much as the plant, though a TV crew blocked the shot for a time. On Thursday afternoon, visitors could also be seen posing for photos by the 4-foot plant.
Since the wait to meet Horace in the North Garden was as much as two hours or even longer by Thursday afternoon, the line was scheduled to be cut off by 4 p.m. as the conservatory closes daily at 6 p.m. for weddings and evening events.
The line eventually snaked from outside the conservatory’s front entrance, through the foyer, Fern Room, Palm Dome, Sunken Garden and back through the Palm Room before reaching the North Garden.
The conservatory is open from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. daily, including Memorial Day — though the bloom usually lasts only a day or so.
A rare bloom
This is the first time that Horace has bloomed since arriving at Como Park Zoo and Conservatory in 2019. Horace and a second corpse flower both came from seeds from the same parent plants that were started at the Greater Des Moines Botanical Garden. They are unrelated to two other corpse flowers that previously bloomed at Como but are no longer in the conservatory’s possession.
As for the name: Horace is dubbed after landscape architect Horace Cleveland, who designed much of the Twin Cities urban park system, including Como.
Here’s a short video we took of Horace on Thursday.
What makes a corpse flower’s bloom so special? The smell of Amorphophallus titanum, or titan arum, is best described by its “corpse flower” nickname, though its size and rare bloom are almost as much a spectacle. Corpse flowers, which hail from the island of Sumatra, Indonesia, can grow leaf structures up to 15 feet tall. They are best known for their stink, which is in full effect on the unique occasion they unfurl their massive floral structure. The plant produces the odor in order to attract carrion beetles and flesh flies, which assist with pollination.
The flowers bloom for just one to three days once every year or two, at best, and sometimes just once a decade. However, the stench typically peaks within a day.
Fewer than 1,000 individual corpse flowers remain in the wild.
How to see Horace
You can sniff Horace’s fetid odor at the Como Exhibit Gallery daily from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m., or tune into the livestream and watch others brave Horace’s stink, and get more information, at comozooconservatory.org/horace.
The plant’s livestream feed can currently be viewed on YouTube.
While at the Marjorie McNeely Conservatory, visitors also can take in the summer flower show, which opened May 3 and features cherry red and pink annuals.
Reaction
The livestream chatter, followed by as many as 1,800 viewers at a time, includes helpful, real-time reports from conservatory visitors discussing wait times, parking and more, as well as general commentary:
“No, Como won’t stay open late tonight. Line gets cut off at 4. It’s on their Facebook page.”
“The line is hot. Make sure you’re prepared.”
“I’d bring water.”
“Slight smell at beginning of line, but goes away after a few feet. Could have been a person.”
For more information, visit comozooconservatory.org/horace.
Kraig Odden and John Autey contributed to this report.
