CUSPIDATA var. CUSPIDATA (engl./ fr.)
Synonym : Echeveria parrasensis Walther (1959)
Series Urbiniae
Type : Palmer s.n., collected near Saltillo in 1902. Rose 509.
Etymology : Cuspidate = ending in a sharp point, referring to the leaf tips.
Distribution : Mexico (Coahuila, Nuevo Leon)
First Description by Rose in Bulletin of the New York Botanical Garden 3: 9. 1903 :
Acaulescent.
Leaves in a dense rosette, sometimes a hundred or more, very glaucous on both sides, somewhat tinged with red, obovate in outline, about 6 cm long, often 3.5 cm broad at widest point, cuspidate.
Flowering stalk 20 - 40 cm long, glabrous and pale, sometimes rose-colored, bearing throughout its length scattered small ovate leaves free at base and acute at each end.
Inflorescence a simple secund raceme, at first strongly nodding, about 15-flowered, buds arranged in two rows, obtusish, lower pedicels elongated, 10 mm long or less.
Flowers : Sepals unequal, all much shorter than the corolla, ovate, acute, corolla 1 cm long, purplish with yellowish slightly spreading acute tips, the lobes united for about one fourth their length, stamens 10, all inserted on the corolla-tube, the 5 opposite the sepals inserted at the top of the tube, the other 5 inserted a little lower down on the tube, carpels erect, free to the base.
Link to Kimnach's description 2005 in English and French.
Read also Myron Kimnach's article : "Three varieties of Echeveria cuspidata"
Note :
Echeveria cuspidata is a very variable species. Most forms of var. cuspidata are much bigger than var. zaragozae. But the flowers of all clones are almost identical.
Plants in habitat in Mexico :
Plantes dans l'habitat, au Mexique :




Plants in cultivation :


Photos Jacquie Koutsoudis
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Photos Christophe Camassel


Photos Margrit Bischofberger
A variegated form :

Photo Leo Gonzalez