This form is very ornamental and could achieve a conspicuous contrast planted in conjunction with the other color forms.
At the National Exposition of Bromeliads, held in Caracas on April 18th through 20th, 1997, a young lady brought in a white-flowered specimen of Aechmea aquilega (Salisbury) Grisebach in to the show. To my knowledge, a white-flowered specimen had never been seen before. Elsa Monteverde de Baasch, a bromeliad enthusiast, collected the plant in 1990 near sea level in a dry coastal town named Tucacas, in Carabobo State. The species is more abundant however in Higuerote (Barlovento) about l00 km from Caracas in Miranda State, where it grows by the thousands. It can be found scattered all along the Venezuelan coast from 10 to 300 m elevation, including Margarita Island.
In Barlovento there is an enormous cocoa plantation with huge old shade trees covered with orchids, aroids, bromeliads and other epiphytes. Included among the bromeliads are: Aechmea aquilega var. aquilega (red form) which is the most common, followed by A. lingulata, A. nudicaulis, Guzmania monostachia, Tillandsia elongata var. subimbricata, T juncea, T. fasciculata, V. procera var. rubra, V. splendens var. splendens, V. splendens var. formosa, and V. heliconioides. —SeeRousse 1998p. 48(5): 232-233
