Aechmea mexicana Baker

Aechmea mexicana Baker, Jour. Bot. 17: 165. 1879
Hoplophytum grande E. Morren; Baker, Handb. Bromel. 50, as synonym. 1889. Aechmea Bernoulliana Wittm. Bot. Jahrb. 14: Beibl. 32: 1. 1891.
Plant from 7 dm. to well over 1 m. high; leaves many in a dense utriculate rosette, 6-12 dm. long; sheaths rather indistinct, ovate, brown, densely and finely brown-lepidotc; blades ligulate, acute to rounded-apiculate, pungent, 6-12 cm. wide, armed with straight spines up to 2 mm. long, finely pale-Iepidote especially beneath; scape erect, stout, pale-furfuraceous; scape-bracts up to 18 cm. long, much exceeding the internodes, linear-lanceolate, acuminate, entire, membranaceous, stramineous, pale-lepidote, the upper ones deflexed; inflorescence amply paniculate, subcylindric to slenderly pyramidal, 3-7 dm. long, furfuraceous; primary bracts linear to subfiliform, much shorter than the axillary branches, membranaceous; branches spreading, the basal ones much divided and up to 17 cm. long; racemes laxly few-flowered; floral bracts filiform, many times shorter than the pedicels; flowers divergent to spreading; pedicels slender, 4—16 mm. long; sepals broadly triangular-ovate, strongly asymmetric, mucronate, 6 mm. long, free; petals ligulate, emarginate, 10-15 mm. long, red or lilac, bearing 2 scales near the base; epipetalous stamens much connate with the petals; ovary globose or ellipsoid, 6 mm. long, often enlarging in fruit; ovules borne at the top of the cell, distinctly caudate.
Type i.ocai.ity: Orizaba, Vera Cruz.
Distribution: Vera Cruz, Guatemala, and Costa Rica; also in Ecuador.

Aechmea mexicana is a plant species in the genus Aechmea. This species is native to central and southern Mexico, Central America, Colombia and Ecuador.