It has the largest floating leaves of any plant, up to three metres across, with a vertical upturned rim
The giant water lily.
Nature · Ferns, grasses & other plants
Giant water lily
Leaves to 3 m across · named 1837
Victoria amazonica — Nymphaeaceae
The giant water lily of the Amazon has the largest floating leaves of any plant, up to three metres across, each rimmed with a vertical upturned edge and armed underneath with spines and a great radiating web of ribs. Its flower opens white and female on the first evening, traps a scarab beetle overnight, and reopens pink and male on the second, sending the pollen-dusted beetle off to the next bloom. The ribbed leaf famously suggested to Joseph Paxton the structure of the Crystal Palace.
How to spot them
- ▸Circular floating leaves up to 3 m wide with a distinct upturned vertical rim, like a green baking tray
- ▸Undersides spiny and crossed by a deep radiating framework of ribs and air chambers
- ▸Huge single flowers, white on the first night and pink or purplish on the second, heavily scented
- ▸Stalks and stems prickly; leaves held by submerged stalks that can be 8 m long
- ▸Still, warm freshwater of the Amazon basin; in Britain, a heated glasshouse pool
How to know it
Its flower opens white and female on the first evening, shuts on a beetle overnight, and reopens pink and male
The giant water lily — pollination by scarab beetles of the genus Cyclocephala.
The radiating ribs on the underside of its leaf suggested the structure of the Crystal Palace to its designer
The giant water lily — Joseph Paxton, who first flowered it at Chatsworth in 1849.
First named Victoria regia, it honours the queen who reigned when it was described
The giant water lily, now Victoria amazonica.
A glasshouse was built at Kew in 1852 expressly to grow this one plant, and still bears its name
The giant water lily — Kew's Waterlily House.
A third species of its genus, grown unrecognised at Kew for years, was described as new to science in 2022
The giant water lily's genus; the new species is Victoria boliviana.
Quick-fire facts
- •The leaves are the largest floating leaves of any plant, reaching about 3 m across, held on submerged stalks up to 8 m long (Kew)
- •Native to the freshwater lakes and backwaters of the Amazon basin, and discovered in Bolivia in 1801
- •Named in honour of Queen Victoria; originally published as Victoria regia, later corrected to Victoria amazonica
- •Pollinated by scarab beetles, which are shut inside the flower overnight as it changes from female to male and from white to pink
- •Joseph Paxton, head gardener at Chatsworth, first brought it to flower in Britain in 1849 and credited its leaf ribbing as the inspiration for the Crystal Palace of 1851
- •Kew's Waterlily House was built to house it; its giant waterlilies are also grown in the Princess of Wales Conservatory
- •The leaf's buoyancy and rib structure let it support a considerable weight spread evenly — the famous photographs of a child standing on one
- •Victoria boliviana, a third species in the genus, was described at Kew in 2022 after being grown there for years as V. amazonica
- •The upturned leaf rim has small notches that let rainwater drain off
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Sources
- Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew — Giant waterlily — Victoria amazonica
- Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew — Giant waterlily grown at Kew Gardens named new to science