Tillandsia polystachia (L.) L.

Authority

Smith, Lyman B. & Downs, Robert J. 1977. Tillandsioideae (Bromeliaceae). Fl. Neotrop. Monogr. 14 (2): 663-1492. (Published by NYBG Press)

Family

Bromeliaceae

Scientific Name

Tillandsia polystachia (L.) L.

Type

Type. Plumier s n (holotype P), without exact locality, West Indies.

Synonyms

Tillandsia angustifolia Sw., Tillandsia kunthiana Gaudich., Tillandsia parvispica Baker, Tillandsia schlumbergeri E.Morren ex André, Renealmia polystachia L.

Description

Description - Plant stemless, 20-65 cm high. Leaves many in a dense subspreading rosette, usually much exceeded by the inflorescence and arched-recurving, very densely and finely pale-appressed-lepidote throughout, often with a narrow purple margin; sheaths broadly ovate or elliptic-oblong, large and conspicuous, pale ferruginous toward the base, not at all inflated; blades narrowly triangular, filiform-attenuate, 10-25 mm wide at base, usually flat. Scape erect or ascending, slender; scape-bracts foliaceous with erect densely imbricate sheaths and elongate spreading or recurved laminae, green, red, or purple. Inflorescence pinnately or subdigitately compound or very rarely simple, usually subcylindric or slenderly fusiform, dense, to 3 dm long; primary bracts elliptic, acute, much shorter than the axillary spikes, the lower ones short-laminate; spikes erect, sessile, linear in outline, acute, 3-10 cm long, 1 cm wide at anthesis, complanate, dense or subdense. Floral bracts erect, barely to densely imbricate, broadly ovate, broadly acute or obtuse, mucronulate, 15-20 mm long, about equaling the sepals, from barely more than twice to four times as long as the internodes, coriaceous, even or slightly nerved toward apex, glabrous or obscurely lepidote especially toward apex, slightly carinate at extreme apex; flowers subsessile. Sepals elliptic, abruptly acute or obtuse coriaceous, even, glabrous, posteriorly short-connate; petals tubular-erect, ligulate, 3 cm long, violet; stamens and pistil exserted. Capsule slenderly cylindric, acute, 3-4 cm long.

Distribution

Epiphytic, from near sea level to 1800 m alt, Florida, West Indies and Mexico to Brazil and Bolivia.

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