Aeonium
tabuliforme (Haw.) Webb. & Berth.
Tenerife endemic
The unique flat, plate like, (mostly) monocarpic species in
the genus Aeonium . The rosette is composed of over the 100 leaves which are
densely imbricated, glabrous and edges with crowded long soft white cilia. The
most resembling is the Madeiran A. glandulosum . As synonym of the A.
tabuliforme we know tha A. berthelotianum - Bolle- Bonplandia 1859 and the A.
macrolepum - Webb ex Christ . For the first traces of this plant we have to
search in the 16 hundreds, Plukenet in 1696 describes it as "Sedum majus Canarinum akaulon pilis ad oras
foliorum hispidis argenteo-lucidis fimbriatum, Corozone Celio ab Insulanis
dictum" . A lot of discussions followed and the plant has been
described under so many different names. It is only in 1819 that Haworth gave
the name Sempervivum tabulaeforme who afterwards, after the Sempervivum revision,
became Aeonium tabuliforme by Webb and
Berth.
Ho-Yih Liu describes this plant as biennial to
perennial. Biennial = means living 2 or 3 years , perennial = means lives many,
many years. Up to this day I never have had a plant flowering in his 2nd or 3rd
year and no one living longer than 5 years and after flowering the plant dies.
So I think we may not consider this plant as biennial nor perennial.
It is a herbaceous, monocarpic succulent plant
(normally simple plant without offsets) with a very flat, saucer like rosette
who can reach up to 60cm diam.
A. tabuliforme is a plant of vertical rocks and in
normal condition not forming offsets. Sporadically I found plants with so many
offsets and this in only one location, near Icod de los Vinos.
Leaves most closely imbricated, 6 to 16 cm long, 2.5
to 4 cm broad, cuneate and very attenuate below, broadest close to the top,
where abruptly they become rounded, often with a small cusp at the apex; pale
green , glabrous, edges with long, slender white crowded cilia (+ 1mm long) set
on crowded ovoid hyaline papillae. Flowering stem erect, from the rosette,
stout, pubescent, 35 up to 75cm high, leafy throughout with scattered small
sessile patent rhomboid-ovate pubescent leaves, unbranched in lower half.
Inflorescence up to a 35 cm long and broad, ovoid in outline, lax, of many patent branches; branches sparingly
bracteate, dividing near their apex into two to four 6- to 8 flowed branchlets.
Habitat : Tenerife endemic , locally abundant on the
western and northern side of the island. Masca Vallei , Barranco Juan Lopez , between Teno Bajo and Alto ,
Barranco de Itobal, El Palmar, Buena Vista del Norte, Los Silos, Tiera del
Trigo, Barranco Sibora , Garachico, El Tanque, Icod de los Vinos, Tejina , Barranco de la Iglesia (Taganana) , Barranco
de Afur, Barranco de Benijo, Chamorga, etc ..
Aeonium tabuliforme - Faro de Anaga
Aeonium tabuliforme - Afur
Aeonium tabuliforme & Monanthes laxiflora
Afur
Aeonium tabuliforme - Chamorga
Aeonium tabuliforme - Teno Alto
Aeonium tabuliforme & Herman - Afur
Aeonium tabuliforme & Alois Debie - Chamorga
Aeonium tabuliforme - offsetting
Aeonium tabuliforme -
Aeonium tabuliforme - +30cm diam
old model mobi is about 22cm
Aeonium tabuliforme - ready to flower
Aeonium tabuliforme - ready to flower
Aeonium tabuliforme - seeds
Aeonium tabuliforme - different locations -
different
forma !!!
