leaves as many as 20 in a cyathiform rosette, about 4 dm long; sheath indistinct, brown, covered with very appressed brown scales; blade ligulate, abruptly acute, 30–40 mm wide, stiffly coriaceous when dry, densely pale-appressed-lepidote. inflorescence: peduncle erect, half as long as the leaves; peduncle bracts very densely imbricate, foliaceous but much smaller and less rigid than the leaves, erect; fertile part to 16-flowered, dense, cylindric, 15 cm long, 7 cm in diameter; primary bracts suberect even to the apices, ovate, acute or obtusish, about 6 cm long, exceeding the axillary flowers, finely lepidote below; branches wholly aborted; floral bracts exceeding the sepals (?), 18–20 mm long (luther 1995b). flowers 2 in the axil of each primary bract; sepals ca 30 mm long (luther 1995b), distinctly connate into a tube; petals connate into a tube (utley 1978).Edited from : Smith & Downs 1977. Tillandsioideae (Bromeliaceae). in Flora Neotropica.