Billbergia elegans Mart. ex Schult. & Schult.f.
Taxonomic Change:
Literature references:
Comments:
- Billbergia elegans by Derek Butcher in Bromeletter37(3): 2-4. 1999
Plants under this name have had a chequered career in Australia, with some dead ends.
It all started in the 1960's where confusion reigned as to what was a Billbergia sanderiana and what was Billbergia elegans. Eventually all turned out to be Billbergia sanderiana. The problem arose when Adda Abendroth collected plants near her home in Teresopolis, near Rio de Janeiro: She sent seeds to Australia and plants to Lyman Smith for identification. It took some years for Lyman Smith to decide that the plants were Billbergia sanderiana. Meantime 30 years on we still come across a Billbergia sanderiana with Billbergia elegans on the label, because some growers assume the label is always right. It can take some time to correct some plant names and finding a true Billbergia elegans is just one example.
About eight years ago the Butchers became the proud owners of a Billbergia amoena var. carnea from Bill Morris whom, in turn, got it from Elton Leme when Elton was just a lad. I assumed the name was correct. A short time later, Len Colgan had imported a batch of plants from Alvim Seidel and one of the Billbergias flowered, not according to label.
Len sent details to Elton Leme who said the plant was Billbergia amoena var. carnea. The plant we got from Bill Morris was a prettier plant, but different and we have grown on both plants treating them as unresolved puzzles. The 1994 edition of Selbyana had Harry Luther's De Rebus, which is a listing of Bromeliads, named or changed since Smith & Downs. It didn't take me long to see that there were many plants, the descriptions of which I did not know. I have been accumulating these plants slowly ever since. Of course, Harry Luther has all of them at Selby Gardens, but to ask for copies of all my missing descriptions would have stretched my friendship with Harry somewhat! So I asked for those plants which really interested me. The two genera were Neoregelia and Billbergia. The staff at Marie Selby was very helpful. So I got my description of Billbergia amoena var. carnea by Pereira which is as follows:
"Differs from type by the scape bracts, scape bracts, rachis and bottom part of sepals being carnea (in other words Rosy-red)". Now this was a great help!!
In 1995 John Catlan sent me a photograph of an unknown Billbergia which was the same as "MY" Billbergia amoena var. carnea. So I knew it was spreading around Australia.
In 1996 at the Bromeliad Conference in Orlando, Florida Don Beadle gave a talk on Billbergias and one of his slides depicted "MY" Billbergia but he called his plant Billbergia elegans. Those of you who read my article on my `World Trip' will know that I had already asked him if his Billbergia fosteriana had dangly bits, so this was one question I had to defer to later on. I did write to Don but as yet have had no reply.
In 1997 "MY" Billbergia flowered again and I was much more critical in my observations of the various parts. I found the following differences with the written descriptions (colours taken from Grafs Exotica chart):
My Plant B. elegans B. amoena var. carnea
Scape Slightly tomentose , Tomentose Glabrous
Inflorescence Erect Pendant Erect
Floral bracts Top ones as long as ovary Top ones half as long as ovary Minute
Sepals Slightly lepidote, cinnamon Lepidote, green with blue Flocculose at tip, rosy
#13, tip indigo #48 tip red, then green with
blue tip
Is MY plant an erect-flowered Billbergia elegans or a Billbergia amoena var. carnea with large floral bracts or is it a new species? Clearly the Americans believe it to be the long-lost Billbergia elegans.
One characteristic that is not in the description of Billbergia elegans is the vestigial flower shown in B of Fig. 695 (Drawing in S&D) and which occurs in MY plant also. I have now found this phenomenon in other Billbergias but others might like to look out for it.
If I agree with the Americans, it will solve the problem of whether Len Colgan's Billbergia amoena var. carnea is better than mine is, because mine will be an `elegans'. Any information as to a true Billbergia elegans that agrees totally with the formal description would be greatly appreciated.
Addendum:
Since writing this article I have had further information on this problem and Harry Luther has again come to the rescue. Mind you, my query to him was on what I thought was an unrelated problem. Let me do a bit of unravelling!!
Peter Franklin and I have been trying to get hold of old copies of the Bromeliad Society Bulletins by any means at our disposal and photocopying them. In a 1962 edition I found that Mulford Foster had named a Billbergia amoena var. penduliflora. On investigation I found that Lyman Smith had then treated it as a Billbergia sanderiana which I thought strange and asked Harry for his views. He pointed out that in his view Billbergia amoena var. penduliflora was the same as B. elegans and sent me a photocopy of the herbarium specimen of Foster 683 where it was noted "Rich Salmon scape and primary bracts". Billbergia sanderiana is very distinct and is related to B. chlorantha and B. kautskyi, whereas Billbergia elegans seems related to B. amoena. B. amoena seems to be a plant of coastal or near coastal rainforests. B. elegans seems to be a species from inland drier habitats.
I think we all know what a Billbergia sanderiana looks like with its strong spined leaves. The problem now revolves around B. amoena and B. elegans. If your Billbergia amoena var. carnea has rich salmon bracts then it is B. elegans. If your B. amoena var. carnea has rosy red bracts, it is probably its correct name. No doubt there will be more challenges for Billbergia growers because we know there are many acknowledged and not acknowledged forms of B. amoena already growing in Australia.
BILLBERGIA ELEGANS by Derek Butcher
This species has caused us Australians a slight headache over the years. It all started in the 1960’s when Adda Abendroth from Petropolis in Brazil sent us seed of a plant which Lyman Smith could not decide whether it was B. elegans or B. sanderiana.( See B.S. Bulletin May 1957)
We first got the name as B. elegans, but then a few years later it was corrected to B. sanderiana.
Needless to say 30 years later we still come across B. sanderiana with B. elegans on the label! As part of this confusion there is a Billbergia amoena v. penduliflora described by Mulford Foster in 1962, which Smith placed in synonymy under B. sanderiana ( See Smith & Downs page 1996)
I would suggest you ignore this reasoning because Fosters plant is clearly linked to the amoena
/ elegans complex.
In the 1980’s a plant called B. amoena v. carnea arrived in Australia from Brazil and by the 1990’s I had acquired an offset. In the 1990’s another plant called Billbergia sp. was imported from Brazil and on flowering photographs were sent to Elton Leme, who identified it as Billbergia amoena v. carnea. I again acquired an offset, so now I was the proud owner of two different Billbergia amoena v. carnea!
At the 1996 World Conference at Orlando Don Beadle spoke on guess what - Billbergias. Amongst his slides I noticed one of my B. amoena v. carnea BUT he called his plant B. elegans and it had orange scape bracts, just like mine!
What was going on? On returning to Australia I started corresponding with Harry Luther as to this apparent anomaly.. We had been searching for a B. elegans that looked something like B. sanderiana.
Harry pointed out that B. amoena and B. elegans are very closely allied, and went so far as to suggest that he suspects that B. elegans is only an inland, drier area, ecotype, compared to B. amoena being a coastal rain forest ecotype. My plant with the orange scape bracts was B. elegans.
This was in the back of my mind when I prepared to photograph a Billbergia amoena in 1999 that Ruby Ryde of Sydney had collected in Brazil in 1986. It had orange bracts but the inflorescence axis was not orange. I contacted Ruby to find out why she had B. amoena on the label and where did she find it?
The name had been given because it looked like a B. amoena and had been collected when she stayed at the Caraca Monastery near Santa Barbara, Minas Gerais. I remembered that Tom Lineham had been there too and had written an article in the BSI Journal and I found it on page 206 - 1992 volume. Luckily Tom had given an inventory of plants collected on his trip and this included Billbergia elegans.
This meant I just had to refer the problem to Harry and, yes, he confirmed my thoughts of Ruby’s plant being Billbergia elegans.
Letter from Harry Luther 17 Jan 1998
Regarding your concerns about B. elegans, sanderiana, amoena var penduliflora, and perhaps amoena v. carnea they have been a problem for years. B. sanderiana is very distinct, related to B. chlorantha and B. kautskyi; it has NO relationship to B. elegans. B. elegans is similar and perhaps conspecific with B. amoena. B. amoena v. penduliflora is certainly the same as B. elegans. B. amoena v. cylindracea may also be the same but I‘ve seen no material of this taxon.. Getting back to B. amoena v. penduliflora, there may be plants of otherwise typical B. amoena with pendulous inflorescences, one of the Mee paintings that I have seen labelled as B. sanderiana or B. amoena v. penduliflora doesn’t look like B. elegans and may be a pendulous flowered example of B. amoena.
B. amoena seems to be a plant of coastal or near coastal rainforests; B. elegans appears to be an inland plant from Campos rupestris type dry habitats. (Butcher's notes 2008)
- By Derek Butcher in Bromeletter 37(3): 2-4. 1999
Plants under this name have had a chequered career in Australia, with some dead ends.
It all started in the 1960's where confusion reigned as to what was a Billbergia sanderiana and what was Billbergia elegans. Eventually all turned out to be Billbergia sanderiana. The problem arose when Adda Abendroth collected plants near her home in Teresopolis, near Rio de Janeiro: She sent seeds to Australia and plants to Lyman Smith for identification. It took some years for Lyman Smith to decide that the plants were Billbergia sanderiana. Meantime 30 years on we still come across a Billbergia sanderiana with Billbergia elegans on the label, because some growers assume the label is always right. It can take some time to correct some plant names and finding a true Billbergia elegans is just one example.
About eight years ago the Butchers became the proud owners of a Billbergia amoena var. carnea from Bill Morris whom, in turn, got it from Elton Leme when Elton was just a lad. I assumed the name was correct. A short time later, Len Colgan had imported a batch of plants from Alvim Seidel and one of the Billbergias flowered, not according to label.
Len sent details to Elton Leme who said the plant was Billbergia amoena var. carnea. The plant we got from Bill Morris was a prettier plant, but different and we have grown on both plants treating them as unresolved puzzles. The 1994 edition of Selbyana had Harry Luther's De Rebus, which is a listing of Bromeliads, named or changed since Smith & Downs. It didn't take me long to see that there were many plants, the descriptions of which I did not know. I have been accumulating these plants slowly ever since. Of course, Harry Luther has all of them at Selby Gardens, but to ask for copies of all my missing descriptions would have stretched my friendship with Harry somewhat! So I asked for those plants which really interested me. The two genera were Neoregelia and Billbergia. The staff at Marie Selby was very helpful. So I got my description of Billbergia amoena var. carnea by Pereira which is as follows:
"Differs from type by the scape bracts, scape bracts, rachis and bottom part of sepals being carnea (in other words Rosy-red)". Now this was a great help!!
In 1995 John Catlan sent me a photograph of an unknown Billbergia which was the same as "MY" Billbergia amoena var. carnea. So I knew it was spreading around Australia.
In 1996 at the Bromeliad Conference in Orlando, Florida Don Beadle gave a talk on Billbergias and one of his slides depicted "MY" Billbergia but he called his plant Billbergia elegans. Those of you who read my article on my `World Trip' will know that I had already asked him if his Billbergia fosteriana had dangly bits, so this was one question I had to defer to later on. I did write to Don but as yet have had no reply.
In 1997 "MY" Billbergia flowered again and I was much more critical in my observations of the various parts. I found the following differences with the written descriptions (colours taken from Grafs Exotica chart):
My Plant B. elegans B. amoena var. carnea
Scape Slightly tomentose , Tomentose Glabrous
Inflorescence Erect Pendant Erect
Floral bracts Top ones as long as ovary Top ones half as long as ovary Minute
Sepals Slightly lepidote, cinnamon Lepidote, green with blue Flocculose at tip, rosy
#13, tip indigo #48 tip red, then green with
blue tip
Is MY plant an erect-flowered Billbergia elegans or a Billbergia amoena var. carnea with large floral bracts or is it a new species? Clearly the Americans believe it to be the long-lost Billbergia elegans.
One characteristic that is not in the description of Billbergia elegans is the vestigial flower shown in B of Fig. 695 (Drawing in S&D) and which occurs in MY plant also. I have now found this phenomenon in other Billbergias but others might like to look out for it.
If I agree with the Americans, it will solve the problem of whether Len Colgan's Billbergia amoena var. carnea is better than mine is, because mine will be an `elegans'. Any information as to a true Billbergia elegans that agrees totally with the formal description would be greatly appreciated.
Addendum:
Since writing this article I have had further information on this problem and Harry Luther has again come to the rescue. Mind you, my query to him was on what I thought was an unrelated problem. Let me do a bit of unravelling!!
Peter Franklin and I have been trying to get hold of old copies of the Bromeliad Society Bulletins by any means at our disposal and photocopying them. In a 1962 edition I found that Mulford Foster had named a Billbergia amoena var. penduliflora. On investigation I found that Lyman Smith had then treated it as a Billbergia sanderiana which I thought strange and asked Harry for his views. He pointed out that in his view Billbergia amoena var. penduliflora was the same as B. elegans and sent me a photocopy of the herbarium specimen of Foster 683 where it was noted "Rich Salmon scape and primary bracts". Billbergia sanderiana is very distinct and is related to B. chlorantha and B. kautskyi, whereas Billbergia elegans seems related to B. amoena. B. amoena seems to be a plant of coastal or near coastal rainforests. B. elegans seems to be a species from inland drier habitats.
I think we all know what a Billbergia sanderiana looks like with its strong spined leaves. The problem now revolves around B. amoena and B. elegans. If your Billbergia amoena var. carnea has rich salmon bracts then it is B. elegans. If your B. amoena var. carnea has rosy red bracts, it is probably its correct name. No doubt there will be more challenges for Billbergia growers because we know there are many acknowledged and not acknowledged forms of B. amoena already growing in Australia. —See Smith & Downs 1979
