Tillandsia balbisiana |
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northern needleleaf, tillandsia de balbis |
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Habit | Plants single or clustering, flowering to 75 cm. |
Stems | short. |
Leaves | 15–30, many-ranked, reflexed, twisted or contorted, gray, often flushed red, to 65 × 0.6–1.4 cm, appressed-grayish-scaly; sheath conspicuously rust-colored toward base, ovate to elliptic, conspicuously inflated, forming small pseudobulb, 2–4 cm wide; blade linear-triangular, leathery, channeled to involute, apex attenuate. |
Inflorescences | scape conspicuous, erect, 8–30 cm, 2–4 mm diam.; bracts densely imbricate, spreading, recurved and twisted like leaves; sheath of bracts narrowing gradually into blade; spikes erect, 2-pinnate, linear, compressed, 2–10 × 1 cm, apex acute; lateral branches 2–10 (rarely simple). |
Flowers | 5–30, conspicuous; sepals with adaxial pair connate, lanceolate, keeled, 1.5–2 cm, leathery, apex acute, surfaces glabrous; corolla tubular; petals erect, violet, ligulate, to 3.5 cm; stamens exserted; stigma exserted, conduplicate-spiral. |
Fruits | to 4 cm. |
Floral | bracts imbricate, erect, green to red, broad (covering all or most of rachis, rachis not visible at anthesis), elliptic, keeled, 1.5–2 cm, leathery, base not visible at anthesis, apex acute, surfaces glabrous to inconspicuously scaly near apex only, venation even to slight. |
Tillandsia balbisiana |
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Phenology | Flowering spring–summer. |
Habitat | Epiphytic on a variety of hosts in open woods, cypress swamps, coastal forest |
Elevation | 0–30 m (0–100 ft) |
Distribution |
FL; Mexico; Central America; South America; West Indies
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Source | FNA vol. 22. |
Parent taxa | Bromeliaceae > Tillandsia |
Sibling taxa | |
Name authority | Schultes f.: in J. J. Roemer and J. A. Schultes, Syst. Veg. 7(2):1212. (1830) |
Web links |