Another thank you to Andreas of Bogotá (aka Quimbaya@Flickr) for sharing images of plants from Colombia (original). This photograph is part of a set that Andreas has assembled on Cerro de Usaquén. Much appreciated!

I had a difficult time discovering any information about this genus of plants until I broadened my search a little bit and learned that the genus Espeletiopsis (and 7 other related genera) were all once lumped under the genus name Espeletia. That led to discovering this site by Dr. Jason Rauscher, The Espeletia Page. Dr. Rauscher has written a brilliant introduction to this fascinating group of plants. Some tidbits: most of these plants grow in tropical montane regions with the growth form of a giant rosette. The height of plants in these genera range from small rosettes measuring only 5 cm high to the tallest plants in the local landscape at over 5 m. Photographs of some of these giant relatives of today's Espeletiopsis corymbosa can also be found on Dr. Rauscher's site in this gallery of images.