Pitcairnia nuda Baker

  • Authority

    Smith, Lyman B. & Downs, Robert J. 1974. Pitcairnioideae (Bromeliaceae). Fl. Neotrop. Monogr. 14 (1): 1-658. (Published by NYBG Press)

  • Family

    Bromeliaceae

  • Scientific Name

    Pitcairnia nuda Baker

  • Type

    TYPE. Appun 1582 (holotype, K; photo, GH), Rupununi River, Guayana, 1863-64.

  • Synonyms

    Hepetis nuda (Baker) Mez

  • Description

    Description - Plant flowering 1.5-2 m high. Leaves all alike, persistent, many in a broad rosette, arcuate-spreading, 5-8 dm long; sheaths very broadly ovate, ca. 4 cm long, dark castaneous, glabrous; blades very narrowly triangular, not narrowed at base, 25-45 mm wide, lepidote at base when young, obscurely punctulate, glaucous, laxly serrate with dark ascending spines 2-4 mm long. Scape erect, 6-15 mm in diameter, red, glabrous; scape-bracts divergent and not covering the scape, narrowly triangular, serrate, the upper sometimes shorter than the internodes. Inflorescence laxly bipinnate, red, glabrous; primary bracts much shorter than the sterile bases of the branches, the lower ones like the scape-bracts, the upper broadly triangular, entire; branches straight, slender, 3-5 dm long, lax, flattened near base. Floral bracts enfolding the base of the pedicel, suborbicular, minute; pedicels slender, 2-3 cm long; flowers slender, pendent-secund. Sepals narrowly subtriangular, abruptly acute, 4-5 cm long; petals linear, 6 cm long, red, naked; ovary almost wholly superior. Seeds alate.

  • Distribution

    Saxicolous, 75-975 m alt, Venezuela, Guayana and Suriname.

    Venezuela South America| Amazonas Venezuela South America| Guyana South America| Rupununi Guyana South America| Suriname South America|