Swiss researchers: Banner year for 'giant's penis'

BASEL, Switzerland, Sept. 29 (UPI) -- Researchers at a Swiss university said this year's "giant's penis" blossom is the largest the plant has bloomed since it started flowering in 2011.

Scientists at the University of Basel's botanical garden announced Sunday the "giant's penis" blossom, an exotic plant native to the Sumatra equatorial rainforest in Indonesia, bloomed to a height of 100.4 inches, besting its previous blooms of 90.6 inches in 2012 and 80 inches in 2011.

Data for last year's bloom, if it had one, was not released by the researchers.

The world record for a "giant's penis," or titan arum, was set in 2003 when researchers at the University of Bonn in Germany unveiled a 107.9-inch high bloom.

The plant is also sometimes known as a "corpse flower" for the unsavory odor it emits during flowering. The smell has been compared to the odor of a rotting corpse.