plant to 45 cm high. leaves 4 dm long; sheath elliptic, densely alutaceous-lepidote on both sides; blade ligulate, subobtuse, apiculate, 4 cm wide, glabrous above at maturity, minutely pale-appressed-lepidote beneath, chartaceous when dry, armed with spines 1 mm long. inflorescence: peduncle erect, rather stout, densely white-flocculose; peduncle bracts longer than the internodes, lanceolate, acute, entire, membranaceous; fertile part amply paniculate, cylindric, 2 dm long, 6 cm in diameter, densely furfuraceous; primary bracts linear to sub filiform, all but the lowest much shorter than the axillary branches, membranaceous; branches simple, laxly and polystichously 5–10-flowered; floral bracts minute or obsolete, subulate. flowers divergent; pedicel slender, 4 mm long; sepals asymmetric with a lateral wing, 4 mm long including the terminal mucro, free; petals ligulate, obtuse, 7 mm long, yellow, bearing 2 scales near the base; epipetalous stamens much adnate to the petals. pistil: ovary slenderly cylindric, 5 mm long; epigynous tube practically obsolete; ovules borne in the upper half of the cell, broadly caudate.Edited from : Smith & Downs 1979. Bromelioideae (Bromeliaceae) in Flora Neotropica.