Echeveria valvata

First Description by R.V. Moran :

Plant glabrous, with several carrot-shaped roots to 7 mm thick.

Caudex short, erect, mostly unbranched except after injury, 1 - 1.5 cm thick, to 1.5 cm high, the leaf attachment scars 4 - 10 mm wide, 0.25 - 1.5 mm high, each with one main bundle scar.

Rosettes 8 - 15 (-20) cm wide, flattish or to 5 cm high, of 20 - 45 spreading to ascending leaves, crowded on the caudex.

Rosette leaves cuneate-spatulate to narrowly obovate or somewhat rhombic, broadly acute to rounded or subtruncate, often submucronate but commonly with the point deflexed and inconspicuous, bright green or purplish or reddish, at first somewhat glaucous, 4 - 10 cm long, 2 - 3.5 cm wide above, 5 - 12 mm wide at the base, 2 - 5 mm thick at the base where thickest, flattish to broadly and shallowly channeled ventrally, very faintly and obtusely keeled dorsally, the margins acute, narrowly hyaline, often irregularly papillose-denticulate, sometimes somewhat crisped ; young leaves relatively broad, often rhombic and channeled ventrally.

Floral stems at first with the tips reflexed, becoming erect, 10 - 35 cm tall to the inflorescence, to 6 mm wide at the very base, 2.5 - 4 mm thick just above, reddish, slightly glaucous, bare in the lower 1 - 10 cm, with 7 - 15 leaves unevenly distributed above. Stem leaves attached ventrally, appressed to the stem at least in their lower part but sometimes with tips outcurved, elliptic to oblanceolate or narrowly obovate, broadly acute or rather blunt, spurred, 1 - 2 cm long, 5 - 8 mm wide, ca 2 mm thick, flat or slightly concave ventrally, the margins acute, the spur whitish, acute to rounded or truncate.

Inflorescence a single cincinnus, at first circinate, becoming erect, 7 - 18 cm long, with 10 - 27 flowers opening at ca 45° below and closing slightly above the horizontal. Bracts at first imbricate, elliptic, acute, spurred, to 1.5 cm long and 7 mm wide. Pedicels 1.5 - 3 mm thick, mostly less than 1 mm long but the lowest sometimes to 3 mm. Flowers in June to September (San Diego), opening at intervals of ca 2 - 2.5 days, remaining open ca 4 - 5 days.

Flowers : Calyx 7 - 13 mm long, 6 - 10 mm wide, green above, at anthesis pink in the lower third but becoming green, the disk 5 - 8 mm wide, subtruncate to tapering below, the segments unequal, often most noticeably so in width, erect, appressed to the corolla (type) or with tips to 2 mm from it, shorter to longer than the corolla, triangular-lanceolate to narrowly triangular-ovate, acute, 6 - 12 mm long, 2 - 6 mm wide, ca 1 mm thick, with rounded margins, after anthesis connivent and the calyx conic, the intervals narrowly V-shaped, open ca 0.5 - 1.5 mm at anthesis but closed in bud and soon after anthesis. Corolla 7 - 11 mm long, 5.5 - 9 mm wide at the base,3 - 8 mm wide at the apex, near raspberry red above though glaucous and appearing pink, paler below, somewhat pentagonal at the base but scarcely so above, the sides flat. Petals connate 0.5 - 1 mm, valvate throughout in bud, valvate to above the middle in anthesis or very slightly open near the base, erect and straight (type) or with the tips slightly outcurved, triangular-lanceolate, broadly to narrowly acute, 2.75 - 4.5 mm wide, ca 0.5 - 1 mm thick, with margins broadly acute dorsally and rounded ventrally, dorsally gibbous at the base and obtusely keeled, ventrally flattened at the tip, round-channeled below ......