Close-up of Stapelia grandiflora
Stapelia grandiflora is native to the Northern Cape and Eastern Cape provinces of South Africa. It has a long list of common names, including carrion flower, starfish flower, starfish cactus, and giant toad plant. These names are shared with the similar Stapelia gigantea, featured on BPotD in 2005. Contrary to some of its common names, starfish cactus is not actually a cactus, though it is a succulent. It does resemble a starfish!
Starfish cactus is a procumbent, creeping perennial. It grows in large clusters around 50cm (20 inches) in diameter. Each star-shaped flower is generally 15cm (6in) across, and coloured dark orange, red, or brown–this makes the flowers of Stapelia grandiflora smaller than those of Stapelia gigantea. Starfish cactus flowers open intermittently through the summer and autumn, but can bloom year-round in greenhouse environments. The flower buds resemble the onion-shaped domes associated with Russian Orthodox churches.
Carrion flower is named for its successful mimicry of decaying animal flesh. Both the appearance (the colour and the banding resembling animal tissues) and the odour attract its main pollinators, flies (a set of characters when combined together form a pollination syndrome termed sapromyophily). Flies will lay their eggs in decomposing flesh, which is a food source for their larvae. Flies drawn to the strong smell of Stapelia grandiflora will both mistakenly lay their eggs on the surface of the flower and inadvertently pollinate it. Carrion flowers grow in low densities in areas where pollinating insects are not abundant, so the potent odour is an effective mechanism for ensuring visitation to multiple flowers. Despite the fragrance, Stapelia grandiflora is a common house plant, for both its easy care and interesting appearance.
Apologies for the lack of entries lately — it’s all on me! I remember when December used to be a quiet month, at least in the workplace. Not so much anymore.
Look forward to and enjoy all your entries. No apologies needed. Thank you for your dedication.
Not to worry! We are grateful for every beuatiful entry! Thanks for all you do.
As to date I have every issue of the Journal, Asklepios, the official publication of the International Asclepiad Society. As a child Stapelia gigantea was the first stapeliad that I grew, before I had any idea what a plant family was. In those days, in the 1950’s, it would have been a fairly common exotic in sunny gardens, especially those dedicated to cacti and succulents because of the ease of propagating it from cuttings and its low nutritional requirements. It does need full sun and good air circulation. Weeds, encouraged by our heavy tropical summer rains are usually the end of these types of plants in South Florida. The best planting of S, gigantea that I ever saw was in a raised bed about two meters in radius around a flag pole outside the administrative office of Bahia Honda State Park (in the middle Florida Keys) in the full sun of beach side conditions. The plants formed a solid ground cover and were full of blooms cascading over the oolitic limestone sides of the bed. Some years later I passed through there and the planting was no longer there. I thought it was a shame because it was such an excellent example of how this type of plant grows and how it could be used in the landscape. It might have been removed because it wasn’t native. I think that the time is coming when the priority is going to be saving whatever species that can be saved regardless as to whether they are native or not.
Hi Everett. Good to hear you have all the issues of Asklepios! I was editor for 15 years and am now back in the editorial team as well as continuing as chairman! I live in the south of Spain now and a roundabout near our local shopping centre is planted with some very large cacti as well as Stapelia grandiflora and I often admire the very large flowers. Flies love this species and lay their eggs which rapidly hatch but then die of hunger…
One of my first and favorite succulents. I will never forget the expression on my step-fathers face when I held it up for him to smell my pretty flower!