A region of western Asia, in what is now Iraq, known as the âcradle of civilization.â Western writing first developed there, done with sticks on clay tablets. Agricultural organization on a large scale also began in Mesopotamia, along with work in bronze and iron (see Bronze Age and Iron Age).
Analysis: The photo is real â this orchid does exist, and the colorful center of the flower does resemble the face of a monkey or baboon â but the captions above are only semi-correct. The actual species name of the flower is Dracula gigas (Dracula meaning dragon, gigas meaning giant), not, as claimed above, Dracula simia.
Absolutely not! Of the 20,000 species of orchids that grow around the world, not one is parasitic. In nature, many orchids cling to trees and bushes as a growth habit; but they take nothing from the host plant and do not injure it in any way. Orchids that grow on trees are called epiphytes or, more commonly, air plants.