Rafflesia patma again invite the attention of visitors of the Bogor Botanical Gardens. Flowers maroon young giant with beige spots, the perfect bloom since Wednesday (2/6). Enjoy the beauty of this flower is rather difficult, because it can not be determined when it will bloom again, and usually the flowers bloom will last only about 4 days, and then withered.
Plants that are said to fascinate Sir Stamford Raffles and Dr. Joseph Arnold (inventor of Rafflesia in the jungles of Sumatra arnoldi 1818) was also not able to grow in any place. These plants are found only in very specific places which become habitat. "This tree of life as a parasite alias parasites and still have not found a way to membudidayakannya," said Sofi Mursidawati MSc, researcher at the Bogor Botanical Gardens on Friday.
Judging from the evolutionary line, the Rafflesia plant world is known as one of the most modern plants because it has a sophisticated survival strategy and efficient. Vegetative organs are essential such as leaves and roots are not owned, but his body just a flower that serves as the successor to the reproductive organs of offspring.
Parasitism gone through as the efficiency and compensation of the absence of leaves and roots like other plants owned. As a true parasite Rafflesia did not have the chlorophyll or green item leaf. As a result he is unable to perform the process of photosynthesis and a hundred percent dependent all his life in the host tree.
Because Rafflesia live and breed in the stems or roots of host trees, the plants appear any time from the inside of the host plant so that it is also known as plant endoparasit (endo = inside).
Host plants that host is Tetrastigma spp, which is a kind of plant climbers who still are related to wine. "Rafflesia must be very clever to keep themselves so as not to cause its host to die because inanglah which became the place to eat and breed," said Sofi.
Equilibrium with its host is maintained by limiting the number of population so as not to kill the host tree. Rafflesia will reduce the number itself if too much. "Skill Rafflesia maintain this balance is likely to be living strategies as well as the causes of rarity. Evolution of Rafflesia with its host has been running since thousands of years ago, "he said.
Sofi add Rafflesia have a close relationship with their habitat so that life is difficult to manipulate. "It will depend on the ecosystem from the host tree, insect pollinators, seed dispersers through micro and macro climate very specific habitat," he said.
Since 2004, Patma Rafflesia flowers are in the Bogor Botanical Gardens. According to the Bogor botanical gardens Sofi success in transferring R. patma this time is just the first step of a big job to make a Rafflesia population who live outside their habitat. "Most of the biological life remains a mystery to the experts of plant conservation.
Regeneration, conservation and cultivation of endemic plants is not something that is impossible but a wonderful challenge to be explored in greater depth, "he said.
