Pretty pictures: Neoregelia cvv.

In June, the place where I used to work got a shipment of tropicals in, including a bunch of Neoregelias that looked like somebody'd been misting them with acid or something -- the leaves had dead patches here and there, to the point where they were basically unsellable. As far as I know, they never got an explanation for why this would have happened, though they did get credit on that box, at least. Employees, and former employees (i.e. me), bought them at the low, low price of only $5, which was sort of a win for everybody involved: I, and various other people, got some pretty large Neoregelias for cheap, the business doesn't have to put the time and effort into caring for them, and everybody's happy. Because they're Neos, it's probably going to take a long time before they outgrow the damaged foliage, but also because they're Neos, they're almost certainly going to live long enough to do so. So that's good. This is the one I bought, which in person is more purple and less orange than this. There was no ID tag with it, but I do have a guess: read on.


This plant is one I bought maybe a year earlier, in the aftermath of my back-to-back emergency room visits; as you can see from the photo then, it's not as dark as it used to be. (It had to live in a spot without a lot of light for a little while, hence the green older leaves, but I've got it under some shop lights now and the new growth, as you can see, is coming in nice and purple.) My best guess for a variety name is 'Royal Burgundy,' primarily due to this site, which I suspect is where my plant was originally grown.¹


This one, Neoregelia 'Medium Rare,' I don't actually own, but it arrived with identification at work so I figured I ought to document it anyway. Also it is pretty. They probably still have at least one where I used to work, but this is similar enough to one I have already (the maybe-'Victoria' one) that I don't feel an urgent need to acquire 'Medium Rare.'

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¹ I suspect this because they include pictures of 'Medium Rare,' 'Yang,' 'Fireball,' and 'Gazpacho,' all of which are plants that came in with IDs (though there were many more that did not). If this is in fact the source, the first NOID picture is probably of 'Purple Star,' and I also have 'Victoria' (maybe 'Nuance') and 'Perfection.' If I'm wrong, and this isn't where our bromeliads were coming from, then of course my NOIDs could be anything at all, and I have no idea. I'd like to think there's a chance I know what I've got, though.