Deuterocohnia Brevifolia, Abromeitiella Chlorantha, Evergreen bluish-green mounding Miniature Bromeliad, the small 1"-2" rosettes forming a low mound up to 3' Diameter.

These are very cool miniature bromeliads that grow into large mounds. Visually stunning alien-looking.

Evergreen mounding Bromeliad, the small 1-2", rosettes forming a low mound up to 3 feet in diameter. Leaves are bluish-green with a few spines on the margins; flowers are yellow-green, appearing in early winter. They prefer bright light - full sun or, in the hottest places, light shade -- and well-drained soil. Though drought tolerant, growth is better with summer water.

It is a low densely caespitose perennial cushion forming sub-succulent herb, a very peculiar terrestrial bromeliad that forms a neat, ultimately large and compact rounded 'mound' with hundreds of small narrowly standing rosettes of leaves. Grow it like succulents in full sun to light shade and well-drained soil. They are slow-growing and Plants very drought tolerant. They should be watered regularly, especially during the summer months, keep dry in winter. It is probably one of the cold hardiest of the bromeliads, but detesting winter wet on its foliage, proves difficult to keep outside.

Frost hardy in upper USDA zone 9. Does not handle cold well; Prefers Zone 9b-11b -3.9°C (25°F)


Deuterocohnia brevifolia (Abromeitiella brevifolia) is a dwarf, succulent, bromeliad growing terrestrially. It forms 3-5 cm wide rosettes of lance-shaped to triangular stiff, fleshy, leaves that proliferate via offsets to form a compact rounded 'mound' up to 90-180 cm in diameter. These colonies from a distance often look soft and moss-like but they are anything but soft and cushy and touching or sitting on a plant would but more like encountering a bed of nails. Inconspicuous green flowers are borne on short inflorescences. A. brevifolia, distinguished by its relatively smooth leaf margins, has both a large and a small form, the latter (often with many marginal teeth) sometimes sold under the synonym A. chlorantha.
Rosettes: Small, star-like, compact of elongated triangular leaves about 3 cm long, thick and fleshy with spineless margins. It is a very variable species from quite variable habitats. In humid, seasonally wet areas the little rosettes can be green, glabrous and glossy but in more arid locations the plants leaf surfaces can posses varying amounts of trichomes giving the rosettes a greenish-gray appearance.
Leaves: Simple, basal, and sessile. Ovate-triangular, 2-3 cm long, at the base 8-14 mm wide, tapering, margins spineless or spiny (subsp. chlorantha), fleshy-thick.
Flowers: 'cannon-shaped' about 32-33 mm long, 6-7 mm wide, greenish to bright green.
Taxonomy: Deuterocohnia brevifolia was already described and the name validly published by August Heinrich Rudolf Grisebach. It was Michael A. Spencer and Lyman Bradford Smith, however, who reclassified it into todays valid botanical systematics in 1992.

Previously known as Abromeitiella Brevifolia.

ALSO KNOWN AS:

Abromeitiella brevifolia
Abromeitiella chlorantha var. minima
Deuterocohnia brevifolia var. chlorantha
Deuterocohnia brevifolia (Griseb.) M.A.Spencer & L.B.Sm.
Abromeitiella brevifolia (Griseb.) A.Cast.
Dyckia grisebachii Baker
Lindmania brevifolia (Griseb.) Hauman
Meziothamnus brevifolius (Griseb.) Harms
Navia brevifolia Griseb.
Pitcairnia brevifolia (Griseb.) R.E.Fr.