Tillandsia makoyana Baker

Tillandsia makoyana Baker, Handb. Bromel. 189. 1889
Tillandsia cucaensis Wittm. Bot. Jahrb. 14: Beibl. 32: 7. 1891.
Plant stemless, 5-10 dm. high; leaves many in a dense rosette, up to 65 cm. long, densely and finely appressed-cinereous-lepidote throughout; sheaths elliptic-ovate, 12 cm. long, castaneous; blades linear-triangular, caudate-acuminate, 3-5 cm. wide; scape erect, stout, from slightly shorter than to exceeding the leaves; scape-bracts erect, the lower ones lanceolate, linear-laminate, imbricate, the upper ones ovate-lanceolate, acute, sometimes remote; inflorescence simple to amply bipinnate, up to 4 dm. long; primary bracts like the upper scapebracts, scarcely larger than the floral bracts, enfolding the lower half of the sterile base of the axillary branch; spiciform racemes up to 24 cm. long, laxly flowered; rhachis strongly undulate, stout, flattened next the flowers, glabrous; floral bracts broadly ovate, obtuse, shorter than the sepals, about equaling the internodes, coriaceous with a hyaline margin, prominently nerved, ecarinate; flowers erect and closely appressed to the rhachis; pedicels up to 5 mm. long; sepals narrowly elliptic or obovate, obtuse, 25-30 mm. long, very short-connate, coriaceous, even except near the margin, glabrous outside, brown-punctulate-lepidote inside; petals tubular-erect, 5 cm. long, violet or green; stamens and pistil exserted; capsule slenderly cylindric, acute, 6-8 cm. long.
Type locality: "Mexico"; described from cultivation. Distribution: Mexico (?), Guatemala, Honduras, and Costa Rica.