We received this plant a while back from Laos as an unknown caudiciform, that came with a photo of the bloom as seen on this page. We thought it resembled a Hibiscus and subsequently a helpful client solved the mystery for us. It is in fact a hibiscus relative, a vining species of Alelmoschus with large ‘classic’ Hibiscus flowers.

Information given to us quotes the source as Stewart Robert Hinsley from a Malvaceae List. He indicates that this species is a perennial found in forest and grassy slopes amongst other habitats from India to Southern China and even Northern Australia.

A radish-like tuber up to about two inches thick supports vine-like stems to about three feet long. Leaves are pubescent and deeply lobed. The large Hibiscus-like flowers can be white to yellow or red. We have learned that this species likes well draining, moist soils and bright, partially filtered light. It is indeed a strange and spectacular plant!

Not to be confused with Adenium, a completely different genus. Actually succulent forms of the Passifloraceae or Passion Flower family, many Adenias form thick stems which endear them to caudiciform plant lovers. However, when young they little resemble the future finished product. Typical young venenata are tall and resemble an upside-down elongated carrot.

The leaves are accompanied by thread-like tendrils which vine around any available object. The caudex thickens with age and can reach 6 feet in very old plants and the vine can go on for 30 feet or more, but can be trimmed to keep it manageable. Leaves are stelate and the flowers are tiny, green and dioecious. Native to central and eastern Africa.

Thicker and squatter than most other forms of arabicum. These beauties form an extra thick caudex with multiple fat branches that bear many small, pink flowers.

A beautiful hybrid (possibly lueddemanniana x weilbachii) with deep coppery-red leaves and a lavender or purple, erect inflorescence. A large grower that can easily reach 30 inches tall or more, but its upright habit makes it suitable for even limited growing areas. Would be a stunning specimen in landscape in warm regions.

A hardy Australian hybrid named for the gold rush town of Gympie. The plants are upright somewhat tubular rosettes about 20 inches tall, with gray-green leaves and an inflorescence resembling both parents, Ae. gamosepala x caudata, with simple or branching pink spikes and showy yellow flowers. Fairly cold hardy.

Leaves that are blacker than black (for a plant). A graceful rosette that starts out upright then as the inch wide leaves lengthen, arch over, forming a wide rosette. The inflorescence is a handsome pendant spike of red berries and blue flowers.

This variegated form of 'Romero' is a stunning medium-large plant with outstanding albomarginated leaves in a 24 to 30 inch upright rosette.  The inflorescence is a panicle of purplish-red branches that last for months.  

A spectacular plant and well suited for interior use for which it was first developed.

A nice and different clone collected by Harry Luther on a 1987 Selby expedition to Panama with Libby Besse, Joe Halton and John Kress. The plant was found in Bocas del Toro in the vicinity of Chiriqui Grande at about sea level (SEL87-0233A). A stiff leaved plant, more open in shape than some other forms, with silver banding on the leaf undersides and heavy speckling on the upper sides when grown bright. The inflorescence is short, semi-erect with crimson bracts and yellow sepals and petals. Stoloniferous in habit, it grows to about 15 inches tall. A piece of bromeliad history!

A nice form of nudicaulis that Wally Berg brought back from a Brazil trip some years ago. We do not know the exact type, though it looks a lot like capitata in general shape. A stout, wide leaved, tubular rosette with stiff green to yellowish leaves with a slight red marginal blush, red apiculate tips and prominent black spines. The plants have the typical ‘thumb print’ of the species and produce offsets of short, stout stolons. A decorative plant for mounting or for a hanging basket.

An interesting Brazilian form from the collection of Elton Leme, in a species with many forms. A 24 inch tubular plant, green with some mottling and characteristic deep ‘thumbprints’. The showy inflorescence is a yellow head with bright red bracts.

An exceptionally fine clone of this colorful form. Tubular with stiff, flaring leaves that are heavily armed with large black spines. Light green base color with black, brown and purple veneer. This plant comes from the collection of the Marie Selby Botanical Garden with the code of (SEL95-0072A).

Accession notes record that it was collected by Luther, Leme, Nahoum, Benzing, Till Krugel in Datas-Diamantina, Minas Gerais in roadside trees, campos rupestris as an epiphyte in February, 1995. A chance to own a truly fine specimen with impeccable records.

A nice form of this variable species which was collected by Berg and Anderson in Brazil. This form has stiff leaves, an upright, tubular shape, and the classic ’thumb-print’. The leaves are gray-green with silvery bands and the inflorescence is a compact cone with yellow flowers and bright red bracts.

This is one outstanding plant! A dark-chocolate colored plant with silver banding that Ray Coleman and I brought from Brazil a few years ago. The leaves are stiff and spiny in a tubular shape with the definitive ‘thumb print’ in the side. Just recently this plant was given a cultivar name by Eloise Beach, who called it ‘Rafa‘ after Rafael Oliveira deFaria who originally collected it near Sao Fidelis in Rio de Janeiro state, in 2001.

A legendary plant. When you look up ‘rare’ in the dictionary, you should see a picture of tayoensis. This plant has only been collected a few times in nature, in Ecuador and Peru. Most, if not all plants in cultivation came from these two collections. The most well know plant was Wally Berg’s which won the ‘Best in Show’ award at the Bromeliad World Conference in Orlando in 1996. At that same show, another plant was donated by the Marie Selby Botanical Garden and was auctioned off for $1,200.00 to a buyer from the Philippines. The plant is a large grower, to over 4 feet in diameter. The leaves are petiolate with a narrow spiny petiole and a broad, spineless leaf. The plants are green, tinted orange-red. The inflorescence is a spiny head of many recurving, orange-red bracts and yellow flowers and can last for a year or more. Grow warm and moist (not wet) in shade to bright shade.

A bromeliad, rare in cultivation, native to the Guyana Shield formation of Suriname where it grows as a lithophyte on granite in the vicinity of Voltzberg.  Originally described as a species by L.B. Smith, it is now recognized as a natural hybrid of Aechmea aquilega and Aechmea moonenii.  A large grower with spiny, strap-like leaves of bronzy-green form an upright rosette to over three feet tall.  The inflorescence is nodding, with yellow branches in a loose cluster, and long pinkish-red scape bracts.  The flowers are deep yellow-orange.  Our plants originated from a field collection by Moonen and came to us from the collection of the Marie Selby Botanical Gardens (SEL2006-0109).

A very attractive variegated form of this decorative species from northern Mexico that can reach 2 feet across and high. It has fairly wide, fleshy leaves and is colored somewhat glaucous green with bright white margins. This plant stays solitary until it blooms then forms many offsets and makes an attractive clump. Keep partially shaded for best results, though we grow it without problems in full sun. Avoid freezing temps and frost.

Not really imperialis or brasiliana, but a new species that will be called mucugensis.

For lovers of weird, a nearly leafless, shrub-like member of the Didiereaceae that can reach nearly 10 feet tall but grows in a rather haphazard clump of tangled branches.  The cylindrical stems are kind of olive green with silver tricomes and bears scattered conical spines which are stout but not ‘dangerous’. 

Native to southern coastal Madagascar in the regions of the thorn forest from near sea level to almost 1,000 feet. A dioecious species that requires both sexes to set seed, but is easily propagated from cuttings.  Reportedly slow growing but we do not find this to be especially true.  Best grown in full sun to partial shade, well drained soils and moderate watering.  Protect from freezing.

This Amorphophallus is native to Cambodia, Laos, Thailand and Vietnam. The leaves may be spotted or all green. It was formerly called Pseudodracontium lacourii.