Geohintonia

Geohintonia mexicana

Geohintonia mexicana is the only species of the monotypic genus Geohintonia in the cactus family ( Cactaceae ). The genus name was in honor of George Sebastian Hinton ( b. 1949 ), a Mexican farmer and plant collector from the state of Nuevo León named.

Description

The plants are spherical stem succulents of up to 10 cm in diameter and 11 cm in height. The blue-green plant body carries 18 to 20 ungehöckerte ribs. The areolae run along the ribs and are very tight. At young areoles thorns are trained up to 3, but which soon fall off. The thorns are colored up to 1.2 cm long and yellowish. The flowers are 2-4 cm in diameter and appear in the apex. They are open during the day and magenta pink to.

Distribution and ecology

The plants grow only in Mexico in the state of Nuevo León on gypsum hills. At the site you can still find Aztekium hintonii. It is believed that the nature of a natural hybrid with Aztekium hintonii as a parent could have arisen. The species is considered critically endangered and has been included in Appendix I of CITES (CITES ).

In the Red List of Threatened Species IUCN is the species as " Near Threatened (NT) ", ie out to be low risk.

System

The plants were discovered in 1991 by George S. Hinton and 1992, the genus and the type of Charles Edward Glass and Alfred Walter Fitz Maurice was first described. A synonym was created by a not accepted Umkombination in 2000 Echinocactus mexicanus ( Glass & WAFitz Maurice) Halda.