April 03, 2023
By Sonakshi Kandhari
I
It is spring, and many places across the globe are covered in a bed of flowers. Among the approximately 4 lakh flowering plants, here are the top 10 rarest flowers in the world. These flowers are rare for the conditions under which they are produced, for their frequency of blooming, and for the places in which they are found.
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Named after the Shakespeare play Romeo and Juliet because of its beauty, this apricot-coloured English rose takes 15 years to develop. It’s the world’s rarest, prettiest and most expensive flower.
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Only found in the rainforests of the Philippines, this claw-shaped flower comes in shades of blue and green. Rats are responsible for the pollination of this flower. Since its natural habitat is being destroyed, this flower is on the verge of extinction.
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Also called a flame lily, this trumpet-shaped flower has red and orange-coloured petals. Not the delicate beauty it looks like, this flower is poisonous and can be fatal to human beings and animals. But on the contrary, it has also been a traditional medicine to treat many ailments.
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This frog-shaped flower grows without leaves, and a stem only supported by its roots growing on a tree's bark appears like it's eerily suspended. This flower is admired for the pleasant, apple-like fragrance that it gives off in the morning.
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It is the world’s rarest flower. Unlike its name, this flower is deep pink in colour. Knowing that this flower has many health benefits, it’s saddening to know that it's found only in two locations in the world (a garden in New Zealand and a greenhouse in the UK).
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Popularly known as the ‘Queen of the Night’, this flower is a night-blooming white star-shaped flower that gives off a vanilla fragrance. Due to its nocturnal nature, it attracts bats and moths as pollinators. Seeing it is a matter of luck because it blooms only one night a year.
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It gets its name from its shape and is often described as the world's most beautiful flower. It's close to extinction, and this flower can be admired in the Canary Islands. It's even often confused with a Christmas decoration because the leaves are silvery grey and the flowers are crimson.
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Blooming once every 3000 years makes this flower rare. It does not have a scientific name but rather a Sanskrit one: Udumbara, which means flower from heaven. Its blooming is said to imply the reincarnation of Lord Buddha. Another surprising feature of this flower is that it does not require sand or soil to grow.
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Yes, like its name suggests, this flower is black in colour. True to its name, even its blooms are bat-shaped. Another rare feature of this flower is that it sports white, whisker-like threads, which can be as long as 24 inches. One can spot this flower in Bangladesh, Thailand, Vietnam and Cambodia.
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It is better remembered by all as ‘girlfriend’s kiss’ and is largely popular during Valentine’s Day. It gets its name from the extravagant red leaves that it comes with, which look like a human being’s actual lips. The white flowers spring up from inside the leaves.
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