364 days dormant, looks like dead bush. One summer night bursts into 8" wide, creamy-white trumpet flowers.
smells like rotting meat, attracts carrion beetles. Blooms in Sumatra rainforests every 8-20 years. Huge flower, 5ft wide, dark-purple petal, tall stalk.
Kurinji shrub in southern India blooms every 12 years, turning hillsides bluish purple, synchronizing reproduction to outnumber predators.
The talipot, a tropical palm from Sri Lanka and India, features stunning 16-foot-tall flowers but comes at a cost. It flowers once in 75 years, then dies. Its sturdy leaves are used for fans or thatch roofing.
Queen of the Andes, a plant in Peru and Bolivia, blooms every 80-100 years with a 30ft flower spike made of 30,000 smaller flowers. It dies after flowering like other bromeliads.
Chilean thorny plant traps animals, acting as natural fertilizer. Blooms after 11 years, sporting green-yellow flowers.
10ft plant with white-purple trumpet flowers after 7 years. Glossy green leaves when not in bloom. Parent dies, leaves smaller bulbs.
Mexican succulent with large rosette of spiny, gray-green leaves. Blooms between year 10-25, with 30ft tall stalk and greenish-yellow flowers before dying.