Nature

This plant heats itself up to bloom through the snow

Eastern skunk cabbage can hold its flowering hood 15 to 35 degrees Celsius warmer than the freezing air around it, for up to two weeks straight, letting it bloom before winter snow has melted. It generates this heat with a cyanide-resistant metabolic pathway, burning starch reserves at a rate comparable to a small mammal. The warmth also vaporises the plant's carrion-like odour, drawing in early-season pollinating insects.

Roger M. Knutson, Heat Production and Temperature Regulation in Eastern Skunk Cabbage — Science, 1974

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