leaves large, about 8 cm wide, broadly rounded and apiculate, serrulate with teeth scarcely 1 mm long, minutely brown-punctulate throughout. inflorescence: peduncle 8 mm in diameter, densely furfuraceous-lepidote with ferruginous scales; peduncle bracts imbricate, linear lanceolate, membranaceous, lepidote, minutely serrulate; fertile part rather laxly once-branched, 4 dm long, ferruginous-lepidote; primary bracts like the peduncle-bracts, the lower ones much longer than the spikes; spikes densely ellipsoid, 3 cm long, all stipitate, the lower ones for 2 cm; floral bracts 12 mm long, with a mucro as long as the triangular-ovate base, strongly nerved, the upper ones sterile. flowers 14 mm long; sepals free, 6 mm long, strongly asymmetric, mucronate with a spine as long as the base; petals blue when dry, oblong -lanceolate, acute, 10 mm long, each bearing 2 infundibuliform scales much produced upward along the petal. stamens included, the second series highly connate with the petals; ovules obtuse.Edited from : Smith & Downs 1979. Bromelioideae (Bromeliaceae) in Flora Neotropica.