Fun & Fascinating Flower Facts

I came across several trivia sites while googling something else today and thought I would collect a few and post them. Some are fascinating — I thought all of them were interesting. (Especially the “corpse flower”! Google that sucker!) And they all made me say, “Gee, I didn’t know that.” These are mostly cut and paste from a variety of sites.

– White flowers tend to be more strongly scented than their colored kin.

– Prince Charles is paid one daffodil a year as rent for his lands on the Island of Scilly, off the coast of Cornwall.

– Pinks are so called not because of their color but because of the ragged edges, or pinks, on each petal. The color pink is actually named after the flower.

– Sunflower stems were used to fill lifejackets before the advent of modern materials.

– The largest single flower is the Rafflesia or “corpse flower”. It is a type of malodorous lily that can weigh up to 15 lb and be close to 40 inches wide. It apparently smells like rotting flesh. Eww.

– A notch in a tree will remain the same distance from the ground as the tree grows.

– Onions contain a mild antibiotic that fights infections, soothes burns, tames bee stings and relieves the itch of athletes foot.

– The Daisy got its name because the yellow center resembled the sun. It was commonly known as the “day’s eye” and over time, was eventually called daisy.

– The city of Mt. Vernon, Washington … grows more tulips than the entire country of Holland.

– Every plant in Tomorrowland at Disneyland in Anaheim, California, is edible.

– Babe Ruth wore a cabbage leaf under his cap to keep cool. He changed it every two innings.

– A bouquet of a dozen Wolffia blooms would comfortably fit on the head of a pin. A type of duckweed, Wolffia grows on the surface of ponds and slow moving streams. This very minute flowering plant is native to Australia and Malaysia. The plant body is 0.6-0.9 mm long and only 0.2-0.5 mm wide.

– This bit of information appeared in The Garden Diary and Country Home Guide published in 1908. “An old rule is to plant sweet corn in the spring when the leaves of the white oak tree are as large as a mouse’s ear or when the soil feels warm to your bare bottom.” (Make sure the neighbors aren’t watching if you test this one!)