Check out 6 ways orchids use tricks to reproduce

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From flowers that mimic insect mates to blooms that smell like rotting fish, orchids have evolved remarkable strategies to ensure their reproductive success. Experts at the U.S. Botanic Garden in Washington, D.C., explain how these botanical deceivers work and why, despite their impressive bag of tricks, many orchid species are currently considered endangered. Transcript Mandana Tadayon: Orchids are among the largest plant families on Earth — often trading the top spot with daisies as new species get discovered. George Guenther, Advanced Gardener, U. S. Botanic Garden: Orchids are incredibly diverse. There are many thousands of species around the world. They’ve evolved into many different forms and growth habits and flowers and things like that, to facilitate pollination and to adapt to their environments. Tadayon: Dubbed ‘masters of deception’ by the experts at the U.S. Botanic Garden in Washington, D.C., the orchids you’re about to see each have a unique trick to lure in pollinators. #1 Lepanthes, Pollination mechanism: Sexual deception Guenther: So this case features orchids that are pollinated through sexual deception. Specifically, the plants that we have on display right now are species of Lepanthes. Some species of Lepanthes have been observed to be pollinated through pseudocopulation, which means that in many cases, a male fungus gnat — small gnat, visits the flower, thinking it’s a mate. And in doing so, then transfers the pollen when it interacts directly with the reproductive structures of the flower. #2 Phragmipedium Pearcei, Pollination mechanism: False trap deception Guenther: Contrary to popular conception, the pouches on the flowers are not actually traps to consume or catch insects permanently, but they actually serve as part of their pollination mechanism. They are oftentimes pollinated by insects that visit the flowers, fall into the pouches like a trap, and are unable to fly back out of the pouches. And so what they have to do is crawl out the back of the flower.  And in doing so, they deposit pollen and then pick up pollen from this flower when they leave it. The spots specifically on these flowers are meant to imitate aphids. There are small flies whose larvae would naturally eat aphids, and so the flies visit the flowers to lay their eggs amongst the aphids, and then are deceived into the traps and then have to pollinate the flower on their way out. #3 Bulbophyllum Picturatum, Pollination mechanism: Rotten-meat scent deception Guenther: Bulbophyllums have very interesting pollination mechanisms. Many of them use very strong smells to attract things like flies to visit their flowers. They might smell like excrement, rotten meat, rotten fish, things like that that really are good at attracting flies. And when the flies land on the flowers, they then have a little hinged wiggly lip and that lip sort of trips and flips the fly into the center of the flower, the column, where the reproductive structures are, and then the pollen is thereby transferred to the fly from the Bulbophyllum. So, like this Bulbophyllum in this case here has a fairly strong fish smell. It’s actually even more noticeable on warm, sunny days when you think of like the flies being active. #4 Coelogyne Cristata, Pollination mechanism: Food deception Guenther: Members of the