Tillandsia pruinosa Sw.

  • 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 pruinosa Sw.

  • Type

    Type. Swartz s n (S), without exact locality, Jamaica.

  • Synonyms

    Tillandsia breviscapa A.Rich., Platystachys pruinosa Beer, Tillandsia tortilis Baker, Platystachys tortilis Beer

  • Description

    Description - Plant stemless, 8-20 cm high. Leaves in an elongate pseudobulb, to 2 dm long, densely cinereous-lepidote or ferruginous-lepidote with coarse spreading scales; sheaths elliptic to suborbicular, 2-4 cm long, strongly inflated, abruptly contracted into the blade at apex and the inner ones closely enfolding the base of the inflorescence, castaneous; blades usually exceeding the inflorescence, linear, involute-subulate, filiform-attenuate, recurved or contorted, 2-4 mm in diameter. Scape wholly covered by leaf-sheaths. Inflorescence simple or rarely digitately compound from 2-5 spikes; primary bracts ovate, densely lepidote, shorter than the spikes but their foliaceous blades sometimes exceeding them; spikes densely and distichously 5-15-flowered, to 7 cm long and 4 cm wide but usually much smaller, acute, complanate, rhachis straight, angled, densely lepidote. Floral bracts erect, four to five times as long as the internodes, ovate, acute, 20-26 mm long, much exceeding the sepals, carinate toward apex, subcoriaceous, pink at anthesis, densely lepidote with coarse spreading scales; flowers sessile. Sepals broadly elliptic, obtuse, 13-19 mm long, sparsely lepidote or glabrous, coriaceous, subfree; petals linear, obtuse or acute, 3 cm long, violet; stamens exserted. Capsule cylindric, acute, to 55 mm long.

  • Distribution

    Epiphytic, from near sea level to 1200 m alt, Florida, southern Mexico, and Cuba to Ecuador and Brazil.

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