Family: Bromeliad
Sub-Family: Tillandsioideae:
Genus: Tillandsia
Sub-Genus:
Native distribution: Grows as an epiphyite in dry sunny regions in Southern Argentina and Paraguay up to 1,600m (5,500ft)
Habit: A large bold plant that can grow long tapered leaves about 40 long up to 700cm long 6.5cm wide. The plant can get up to 1m wide 600cm high and form a spectacular flower spike rising 800cm above the crown. After flowering I have had plants that then form up to 12 pups.
Foliage: The plant has small arching sliver leaves on an elongated stem
Flowers: Can be reluctant to flower. While the purple flowers are small and short lived - a day or so, the flower spike lasts for about 9 months to a year. Although the flowers are long an tubular, they have confined stamens, and the petals are not keeled. The flowers have a gardenia-like scent
Seed:
Pups:
Cultivation: The plant is slow growing
Fertilization: A mist every week with Epiphyites Delight or Epsom salts during the growing season will help the plant.
( Epiphyte’s Delight fertilizer was developed for a special reason. Nitrogen promotes foliar growth. If you have Tillandsias, Orchids, or other epiphytes and you feed them, take a look at the nitrogen content. If it’s high in urea, the plants can’t use it because the urea needs a bacteria in soil to break it down into ammonia and nitrates. Since the epiphytes don’t have any soil they can’t break down the urea. It was for this reason that we had Epiphyte’s Delight formulated. It contains only ammoniacal and nitrate nitrogen which is immediately accessible and usable by the plants.)
Availability:
|
