'Rotting flesh' flower pulls in Edinburgh crowds

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At Edinburgh’s Royal Botanic Garden, a bad smell is attracting hundreds of visitors at a time.

A huge blooming flower, the Amorphophallus titanum, is on display. Native to the jungles of Sumatra, the garden’s curator says “it smells a bit like a quietly rotting dead sheep”.

The “New Reekie” is a so-called corpse flower which emits a powerful stink of decaying flesh to attract pollinating insects. It is blooming for the first time since June 2015.

The last time it opened up, 20,000 people visited the garden to take in a whiff.