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When we bought our first house, I developed a newfound urge to garden. Guess what? My thumb didn’t get any greener when we acquired a mortgage. I’ve killed pumpkins, grown a tomato-free tomato plant, and demolished not one, not two, but three hanging baskets of different varieties. I’m working on a fourth.
Despite killing everything I touch, I’m still determined to get some cool plants. Below are a few that I look forward to brutally massacring sometime in the near future.
Plant: The Sensitive Plant
What Makes it Cool: When the plant is touched, its leaves immediately fold together. They do the same thing at night due to the absence of light.
How I Will Eventually Kill it: Probably by letting it stay out on our porch too late in the season. The Sensitive Plant suffers when temperatures drop below 65 degrees.
(Also known as the TickleMe Plant, the Shame Plant and the Prayer Plant)
Plant: The Bladderwort
What Makes it Cool: It’s carnivorous. Any organism that gets too close to the tiny hairs on the bladderwort will trigger the trap and thus be sucked into the bladder chamber of the plant, where it starts to be digested. Although it sounds like something out of Little Shop of Horrors, the trap is so tiny that it can only catch small insects like mosquito larvae.
How I Will Eventually Kill it: It’s mainly aquatic, so chances are pretty good that I will try to plant it in soil.
Plant: The Corpse Lily
What Makes it Cool: It smells like decaying flesh or rotting meat. And it’s actually kind of ugly. And it has no leaves or stems. And it only blooms for a week every year. OK, it’s just a really strange plant.
How I Will Eventually Kill it: I will never get a shot at this one, actually, because it’s endangered and only grows in the rain forests of Sumatra and in the Malay Archipelago in Borneo.
Plant: The Walking Iris
What Makes it Cool: New plantlets develop where the previous flowers were on the Iris. The stalk keeps growing, though, so as the plantlet grows, its weight draws the stalk down to the ground. When the plantlet finally rests on the ground, it roots there. This makes it look like the Iris is “walking” across the yard.
How I Will Eventually Kill it: It grows in clumps up to five feet wide, so I imagine I will mow over it at some point.
Plant: The Money Plant, AKA the Honesty Plant
What Makes it Cool: It grows flattened pods that look like silver dollars and make cool rustling noises in a breeze.
How I Will Eventually Kill it: It’s listed as a “beginner” plant, which means it should be easy to grow. “Easy to grow” is pretty much the kiss of death for me. I killed a philodendron.
Plant: Resurrection Fern
What Makes It Cool: It knows how to play dead. During drought periods, the fern goes grey and curls up, appearing to be completely dead. When it receives even a tiny bit of water, it turns lush and green again. Some have estimated that it could be resurrected after up to 100 years.
How I Will Eventually Kill it: I think even I can’t fully kill something that can resurrect itself.
This story originally ran in October 2007. No word on how many plant casualties Stacy is responsible for in the last year.
Comments (19)
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The “corpse lilly” is actually one of the 20-something species of Rafflesia. They also grow on Peninsular Malaysia and I saw a few last week outside of Tanah Rata in the Cameron Highlands.
Our guide pointed out a few things that all the text books seem to have wrong. First off, they don’t smell of *anything* unless you squish a bit of the leaf and smell really, really hard. And then it’s only vaguely of bacon.
His second point was that he reckoned they weren’t flowers at all, but a fungus. I’m no horticulturist, but his argument was mainly regarding the lack of leaves.
They actually grow for anything up to 15 years from the time they take seed before blooming for 5-10 days. And then they die.
posted by Mosh on 9-13-2008 at 10:12 am
Oh, don’t worry Stacy! I used to have the same problem. I finally found plants that even I couldn’t kill! Oddly enough I do better with plants that are hard to grow (maybe I need the challenge) I wish I could translate my plant killing abilities to the crabgrass and other weeds that love my lawn.
posted by JaneM on 9-13-2008 at 10:41 am
I was so bad a gardening that I decided to go to community college for some horticulture classes. After a couple of classes I realized that they needed water. Now my backyard is a butterfly haven. :)
posted by STEPHANIE on 9-13-2008 at 12:06 pm
This summer in Costa Rica, I got a chance to see a sensitive plant in the wild. Our tour guide called it a ’sleepy plant.’ Definitely very cool (and fun to play with).
posted by scoobnut on 9-13-2008 at 1:07 pm
Stacy, you are my soul sister. I can kill any plant. I’ve even killed a FAKE plant. Honest!
I’m getting better though – my tomato plants were extremely fruitful this year.
posted by Rachel on 9-13-2008 at 1:38 pm
I’ve killed SEVERAL plants since this story originally ran, definitely. I just threw out a pathetic African violet the other night, and I have a dead hanging basket on my front porch as we speak (type).
posted by stacy on 9-13-2008 at 2:30 pm
Same thing happened to me. I thought the square yardage would somehow inspire my inner Martha. It did, in that I planted many, many, many-many plants. But then my ADHD kicked back in and they died within a few weeks. Here’s to being overambitious! : )
posted by adrienne on 9-13-2008 at 4:39 pm
I once killed a cactus.
posted by Julia on 9-13-2008 at 5:39 pm
My daughter once killed a cactus by not watering it enough. Honestly.
posted by cmk on 9-13-2008 at 9:36 pm
Woah Julia, you’re less nurturing than a desert.
posted by Will on 9-13-2008 at 9:42 pm
Ever See A Plant MOVE When You Tickle It?
With the new growing kits from
wwwticklemeplant.com a green thumb is not longer needed, to grow this amazing plant. The sensitive plant more commonly known in museums and nature centers as the TickleMe Plant, closes it leaves when Tickled! Even the branches droop when Tickled! What is cool is the company guarantees anyone can grow this plant with the easy grow kits and high quality seeds. It even produces pretty pink flowers. I love the TickleMe Plant and the new TickleMe Plant party favors. I can’t wait to give the kits away for the holiday and the Mini-house- party favor will be great stocking stuffer.
posted by Jenny on 9-14-2008 at 9:04 am
I have managed to kill almost every plant that I have had. (Yes, that includes cactus.) I used to claim that I could only grow mildew.
posted by Phrank Loyed on 9-14-2008 at 10:26 am
wow, i can’t believe all the hype your “tickle me plant” is getting. that stuff grows in everyone’s back yards here, we call them prickles cos there are little barbs on the stems. it’s a weed, some people get it so bad they have to walk around on hands and knees pulling the stuff out with pliers.
posted by Brendan on 9-14-2008 at 6:26 pm
wow you guys talking about killing plants should never ever take an entheogen of any sort. Then again maybe you should.
posted by Peace on 9-15-2008 at 2:23 am
Wow. I thought it was just me! I’ve killed aloe. More than once.
posted by kristin on 12-3-2008 at 9:24 pm
There’s a corpse flower at the Berkeley Botanical Gardens.
it smells positively awful.
posted by Laurel on 12-12-2008 at 3:51 am
I think there is a corpse lily in the New York Botanical Gardens as well. I’ve heard about this flower for YEARS!!! I’m sure that there are other varieties of this plant that are in the same family of plant that don’t smell as badly, but they also aren’t as large AT ALL!! This plant is pollinated by flies which is why it smells like decaying meat or rotting flesh. I believe I first heard about this in either 3-2-1 Contact or National Geographic Kids Magazines. I know I’m a geek. They were my favorite magazines when I was younger (well over 10 years ago). Anyway everyone have a great NEW YEAR!!!
posted by briana on 12-31-2008 at 6:48 pm
The Money Plant is actually called a Judas Penny where I’m from (Michigan). I’ve never heard it called anything else. I’ve got a bunch in my back yard.
posted by Jenny on 1-28-2009 at 1:07 pm
A petition must be started immediately to pass a law to prevent you from owning any more plants(except the resurrection plant).
posted by Ed Smith, Palm Springs, CA on 7-14-2009 at 7:13 pm