plant stemless, 20–25 cm high. leaves many in a dense subspreading rosette, about equaling the inflorescence, rigid, very densely and minutely appressed-lepidote throughout; sheath elliptic-oblong, 3–1 cm long, dark castaneous; blade linear-triangular, 10–15 mm wide at the base, involute-subulate toward the apex, pungent. inflorescence: peduncle erect, short and much obscured by the leaves, stout; peduncle bracts erect, involute, densely imbricate, foliaceous, subinflated; fertile part simple or digitate from 2 subequal sessile spikes; primary bracts like the upper peduncle-bracts but not laminate, scarcely longer than the floral bracts; spikes linear in outline, acuminate, terete, 7–14 cm long, 2 cm in diameter; floral bracts distichous, erect, very densely imbricate, suborbicular, apiculate, 2 cm long, exceeding the sepals, inflated, carinate toward apex, coriaceous, even, glabrous. flowers subsessile; sepals lanceolate, acute, 14 mm long, coriaceous, even, glabrous, carinate and much connate adaxially; petals tubular-erect, 35 mm long. stamens exserted for 10 mm.Edited from : Smith & Downs 1977. Tillandsioideae (Bromeliaceae). in Flora Neotropica.