Puya raimondii

Habit and inflorescence of Puya raimondii in the habitat.

The Puya raimondii ( Riesenbromelie ) is a plant of the family Bromeliaceae ( Bromeliaceae ). It is native to Peru, Bolivia and northern Chile. Puya raimondii thrives at altitudes 3500-4500 meters, especially on sunny and well-watered slopes.

Botanical history

The specific epithet raimondii (but not according to the rules described ) honors the Italian naturalist Antonio Raimondi ( 1824-1890 ) who discovered this species in 1867 and 1874 as Pourretia gigantea first scientifically published. A sketch until 1949 in the estate discovered shows that this type of the Austrian polymath Thaddeus Haenke ( 1761-1816 ) was noted as the first European explorers during his research in Bolivia, Peru and Chile well.

Description

The Puya raimondii constitutes the longest inflorescence in the world ( up to 8 meters high, depending on location), the formation of which can take a year. For this reason, this species was entered into the Guinness Book of World Records. It has a maximum total plant height of 12 meters.

Puya raimondii grows as xerophytic perennial plant. At the age of about 50 to 70 years, the plant has formed a nearly spherical rosette of leaves up to 3 meters in diameter on an unbranched stem with a height of about 2-5 meters and a diameter of about 0.5 meters. The coarse, stiff protruding, parallel venation leaves running into a sharp tip, have a length of 1 to 2 meters and a width of 6 inches. The leaf margin is armed with hooked curved, about 1.5 cm long spines. The upper leaf surface is shiny green to reddish, aged straw yellow depending on the sunlight; the lower leaf surface is scaly pressed tightly.

During the heyday Puya raimondii offers an impressive sight. The upright inflorescence composed of numerous racemose partial inflorescences and bracts with many thousands of individual flowers. The thick, hairy flower stalk is about 7 mm long. The hermaphrodite flowers are triple. The three sepals are about 4 cm long and hairy at the base. The three yellowish-green petals are about 5 cm long and rotate the fading spiral one. At this time, you can often see hundreds hummingbirds and other birds that flit around this. Although this plant can be over 100 years old, it blooms only once for about 9 months. There are trained fruit capsules, each containing many small, capable of flying seeds are formed. Then the plant dies slowly ( the species is therefore hapaxanth ).

Endangering

In the wild, it has become rare, because it is used despite protection programs as fuel, which is scarce at these altitudes. Often the relationships are also burned as prickly rosettes may pose a threat to the grazing livestock. Most likely you can have this style in Huascaran National Park (Peru ) look.

Symbolism

Puya raimondii is the emblem of Peru.

Pictures

In its natural habitat:

Habitat.

Plant prior to the formation of an inflorescence with nearly spherical rosette of leaves on a stem.

Overturned plant Puya raimondii in the San Francisco Botanical Garden:

Section of the inflorescence.

Section of the inflorescence with flower.

Detail of inflorescence.