Puya raimondii

Puya raimondii, also known as queen of the Andes (english),titanka (quechua) or puya de Raimondi (spanish), is the largest species of bromeliad. It is native to Bolivia and Peru and is restricted to the high Andes at an elevation of 3000 – 4800 m.

Taxonomy

The first scientific description of this species was made in 1830 by the French scientist Alcide d'Orbigny after he encountered it in the region of Vacas, Cochabamba, in Bolivia at an altitude of 3960 m (12,992 ft). However, as the plants he saw were immature and not yet flowering, he could not classify them taxonomically.

The specific name of raimondii commemorates the 19th-century Italian scientist Antonio Raimondi, who immigrated to Peru and made extensive botanical expeditions there. He discovered this species later in the region of Chavín de Huantar and published it as Pourretia gigantea in his 1874 book El Perú. In 1928, the name was changed to Puya raimondii by the German botanist Hermann Harms.

Description

It is not only the largest of the Puya species, but also the largest species of bromeliad. It can reach 3 m tall in vegetative growth, and can produce a flower spike 9–10 m tall, with more than three thousand flowers and six million seeds in each plant.