It seems like something out of a movie. In the late winter, in the swampy lowlands of the northeastern United States, you might catch a whiff of rotting flesh. The unlikely source is flowers — maroon pointy things, the size of fists, that protrude from the still-frozen ground like grotesque harbingers of spring.

These are the flowers of the Eastern skunk cabbage (Symplocarpus foetidus), and flies and other pollinators are drawn by their putrid odor as well as by the flowers’ warmth. Skunk cabbage is one of a smattering of plants that can generate remarkable amounts of heat, an ability called thermogenesis: Its floral tissues can reach a toasty 84 degrees Fahrenheit (28.9 degrees Celsius), even on days that are near freezing.

Many different plants exhibit this unusual behavior for a variety of reasons but in most cases it attracts insects that help spread their pollen.