plant rupicolous, propagating by short basal shoots, flowering ca 35 cm tall. leaves fasciculate, all alike, suberect-arcuate, thin in texture, entire, persistent; sheath subtriangular, ca 2 x 1.5 cm, glabrescent, abaxially brown toward base and lustrous, coarsely nerved abaxially, adaxially greenish; blade very narrowly linear-attenuate, slightly narrowed toward base but not petiolate, apex filiform-caudate, 37–45 x 0.8–1.1 cm, inconspicuously nerved, distinctly canaliculate but not carinate, green except for the inconspicuously red margins, laxly to subdensely white-sublanate abaxially with long fimbriate spreading trichomes, laxly lepidote adaxially with long fimbriate spreading trichomes, blade color not obscured by the trichomes. inflorescence: peduncle suberect, ca 18 cm long, 0.3–0.4 cm in diameter, subdensely white-sublanate with long fimbriate spreading trichomes to glabrescent, red; peduncle bracts the basal ones foliaceous and exceeding the peduncle, the upper ones lanceolate-attenuate, filiform-caudate, erect, distinctly longer than the internodes but not concealing the peduncle, subdensely white-sublanate with long fimbriate spreading trichomes, entire, green; fertile part laxly racemose, simple, suberect, distinctly exceeded by the leaves, 4–7 cm long, rachis straight, 1.5–2 mm in diameter, terete to slightly angulose toward apex, red, subdensely white-sublanate with long fimbriate spreading trichomes to glabrescent; floral bracts lanceolate, acuminate, 8–20 x 2–3 mm, entire, membranaceous, greenish to reddish, soon stramineous, suberect to erect, laxly lepidote with long fimbriate spreading trichomes to glabrescent, the basal ones equaling the pedicels, 18–20 x 2.5–3 mm, the upper ones shorter than the pedicels, 6–13 x 1.5–2 mm. flowers 4–7 in number, 60–70 mm long (including the pedicels), laxly arranged, suberect and downwardly secund at anthesis, odorless, pedicel 15–20 mm long, ca 1 mm in diameter at base, ca 2 mm in diameter at apex, terete, red, sparsely white-lanate to glabrous; sepals lanceolate, apex acuminate, erect, ecarinate, 18–20 x 3 mm, red, glabrous; petals sublinear-lanceolate, apex acute, 48 x 5–6 mm, red, erect or slightly recurved at apex at anthesis, convergent over the stamens forming a zygomorphic corolla, unappendaged. stamens about equaling the petals; anther linear, ca 7 mm long, fixed near the base, base sagittate, apex obtuse. pistil: stigma conduplicate-spiral, red, margins entire; ovary subpyramidate, ca 2/3 superior; ovules many, caudate. fruits: seeds bicaudate.Edited from : Leme 2004c. (protologue) Piticairnia nortefluminensis, a New Species from Rio de Janeiro, Brazil .