Family: Bromeliad
Sub-Family: Tillandsioideae:
Genus: Tillandsia
Sub-Genus:
Native distribution: This attractive plant grows in Argentina, Brazil, Bolivia and Paraguay at high elevations from 2,000 (600m) to 8,000ft (2,400M)
Habit: The plant is saxicolous (growing on rocks) and epiphytic, It clumps rapidly. The clump in the photograph has 9 plants.
Foliage: Silver recurved leaves 6-9 inches long about 1/2 inch wide base and gradually tapering to the tip. The foliage is heavily covered with silver trichomes which gives the edge of the leaf a slightly fuzzy texture
Flowers: The long and branched cherry inflorescence is a beautiful, bright contrast to the white leaves. The flowers are small and white.
Seed:
Pups: The plant produces pups from the base
Cultivation: Like many silver Tillandsias the plant can endure hot and dry climates, but responds to regular misting - however make sure that the plant is misted early in the morning so as the foliage can dry out before it is exposed to hot direct sun, as this can destroy the protective trichome cells which reflect much of the harmful ultra violet.
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:
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