Dead rats, putrid flesh and sweaty socks: rare orchid gives botanists a first whiff

The plant has flowered for the first time in Britain, but the climate crisis is making such events rarer than ever

It is famous for smelling like "a thousand dead elephants rotting in the sun", its petals resemble decaying flesh, and it is so rare that outside its natural habitat in Papua New Guinea, few botanists in the world have ever seen it in flower.

Now this highly pungent orchid - Bulbophyllum phalaenopsis - is in bloom for the first time in a glasshouse at Cambridge University Botanic Garden.