Tillandsia capillaris
A tiny, silvery, tufted air plant of dry forest, scrub and rocky Andean slopes from Ecuador and Peru to Argentina and central Chile. It clings to twigs, cacti and rocks in bright, often sunny, dry places with big day–night temperature swings, and lives on dew, mist and brief rains. Grow it mounted, in strong light with plenty of air, and let it dry quickly after every watering.
Where it grows wild
An epiphyte on shrubs and small trees, fences and occasionally rocks in seasonally dry habitats: Peruvian inter-Andean dry forest with Eriotheca, Acacia and columnar cacti, xeric scrub, the Chaco-edge woodlands and sierras of Córdoba in Argentina, and high Andean valleys. It belongs to subgenus Diaphoranthema, the small, dense, grey-scaled Tillandsia that tolerate harsh exposure.
Recorded from 250 m to 4050 m, median 2507 m (156 records): mostly the dry inter-Andean valleys and puna edge, with lowland outliers in the Argentine hills.
🔒 Growing it like that
The wild conditions above, turned into targets for a shelf, a tent or a greenhouse. The full profile has:
Grow Tillandsia capillaris? Add it to a free garden and its full profile opens. Pro opens all 38,374 profiles in the library, plants and fungi.
More Tillandsia
Profiles are drafts built from measured range and climate and from published sources; each section carries its own confidence in the app. Photo from Wikimedia Commons, used under its CC BY-SA 3.0 licence, unmodified.