Amorphophallus titanum blooming at EPCOT

An Amorphophallus titanum has bloomed and the flower opened last Saturday at EPCOT ans apparently stunk up the Disney park (see link below). A friend of mine was contracted to collect pollen but the flower closed by Sunday morning. By the time I got there, he had cut two windows in the sides of the closed flower to access the pollen. You can see one rectangular hole in the photo. The next photo is a close-up that shows the interior goods.
http://blogs.orlandosentinel.com/features_gardening_blog/2008/05/plant-raises-bi.html

Here's the close-up photo showing the interior of the flower. The pollen will be used to polinate a second Titan arum that is just starting to flower in Animal Kingdom. That one will open, and stink up Animal Kingdom, in about a week (I'm guessing May 15th but that's just me throwing a dart at the calandar).

That is really a big VooDoo isn't it? How tall is that baby anyway.

The one at EPCOT (pictured) was as taller than me (I'm 6') but it was in a container. I'd guess the flower was just under 6' tall. The flower at Animal Kingdom is still growing and was already 5 1/2' tall on Thursday. I was told it was gaining about 5" per day. I haven't had any updates since Thursday but that also means the flower hasn't opend yet - it's still growing. It should easily be over 6' tall now and could surpass 7'.
The largest cultivated Titan bloom reached 9 1/2' tall in 2005 at a botanical garden in Germany.

WOW those are nice big ones. Mine bloomed and was 3' tall and I thought it was big.

Oooh, I will be at Disney on May 27th, hopefully they will still have one on display.

The second one bloomed at Animal Kingdom on May 14th. I took my nursery crew up on Sunday the 18th and the bloom was, of course, closed up by then. It was about 6 1/2' tall and still looked to be in good shape. It was pollinated with the pollen collected from the EPCOT specimen that bloomed a few weeks earlier.
The display was at the Train Depot in Africa.
Here's a picture of one of my guys with the Titan (his wet shirt shows evidence of his trip on the the Kali River raft).

Another photo with our nursery manager, Tracy.

Here's the info sign they had in front of the display:

Do wyou knowif either of the plants are still there and where the one in Epcot is? I went to day and could not find it.

Jennifer

The one that was at EPCOT should be long gone by now. The one at Animal Kingdom was polinated so it should be somewhere developing seeds. I doubt it is in a place in the park though. I'd think they would not want anyone reaching in and picking at the seeds or even just touching it.

Thanks, I would have loved to see it. Maybe next year : )

What zones will these thrive in? hoping for zone 8

Here is the plant files entry for it:

http://davesgarden.com/guides/pf/go/69521/