Hydnora africana

Description:

Hydnora africana

From Botanical Society of America Online Image Collection

The flower of Hydnora, when it first opens, has white threadlike structures that cross the gap between the "sepals." The openings between these threads are barely large enough for a beetle to enter. More about that later! Although a beetle may enter a flower, it evidently has difficulty in finding its way out of the flower. This keeps it inside a flower long enough so that the beetle can pick up pollen or deposit pollen on its surface onto the stigmas at the bottom of the floral tube.