Chocolate Cosmea: This plant almost disappeared due to its amazing aroma.

Due to its incredible chocolate smell, this plant was first on the list of rare species, and then it almost disappeared from the face of the Earth. But thanks to the efforts of scientists, this species was not only preserved, but also distributed to all regions of the planet where the climate allows this amazing plant to be grown.

Chocolate, or black cosmea (Latin Cosmos atrosanguineus) belongs to the cosmea genus and is found in the wild in Mexico and in neighboring regions of Latin America. This is a thermophilic plant that prefers open sunny areas of the surface and grows in the form of a bush, 40-60 centimeters high. Chocolate cosmea is a perennial plant, which in the second half of summer is covered with many flowers of deep dark red color. But the main value of these flowers is not in their beauty, but in an incredible smell reminiscent of chocolate and vanillin at the same time. It was because of this unusual aroma that this flower was often torn into bouquets, which ultimately led to a sharp reduction in the number of species.

But botanists took up the salvation of this amazing plant, and thanks to their efforts, the chocolate cosmea was preserved in the wild. At the beginning of the 20th century, fields in Mexico began to be sown with chocolate cosmea seeds, and thus the species was saved from extinction. This incident has become one of the few examples of saving an endangered plant species on our planet.

Not so long ago, based on the original look, several decorative forms of chocolate cosmea were created, the flowers of which are large. Today, this plant can be found in many botanical gardens, and its distribution is limited only by climatic conditions, because this thermophilic plant needs several months in order to grow and bloom. Relatives of this species - various representatives of the cosmea genus - are grown almost everywhere in gardens and city parks. They can be found in Russia.