cristate Lophophora williamsii echinata

[trucha]

This was noticed growing in West Texas several days ago.

Its an echinata in the sense that Croizat and Bravo employed the word rather than as is more commonly applied in European cultivation (see comments posted about Croizat's unfortunate confusion generating combinations elsewhere here).

These northern populations are insanely small and sharply defined. I think this particular population was contained entirely within an area that was maybe 30 feet by less than 100 feet. We would have never found it if the land owner had not mentioned where it was located.

My hand is in the photo for scale.

Edited March 20, 2012 by trucha

[Alice]

Sometimes I think you have the best job in the world.

[Evil Genius]

Really a great find Trucha! Thanks for posting! Hope you collected some pollen.

[trucha]

Thanks.

Outside of some minor points like working for free or paying for working rather than being paid for working I agree wholeheartedly.

I don't mean that to sound like I would need to be paid to do this. Its too much fun to think of as a job.

Edited March 21, 2012 by trucha

[GoOnThen]

Wow very cool

Thanks for posting Trucha

Cheers

Got

[trucha]

Not as pretty but interesting for sake of growing not far away from the other one. I do not know the exact distance but within 5 or 6 meters at most.

The other cactus is Opuntia schottii.

Edited March 31, 2012 by trucha

[mud]

Wow. I never imagined their wild habitat looking like that.

[Sola]

Thanks for sharing trucha, sounds like you do have an awesome job if you come across these throughout the day.

Wish my ethno skills were better when I lived in that part of the world.

Awesome plants, interesting that the cristate genes persist nearby showing localised distribution of pollen.

[trucha]

I came across both crests the same day but am only now in the process of labelling and organizing my way through the nearly 6700+ images I brought back from this trip.

echinata loves rocky open brush with decomposed limestone soils and lots of sun, williamsii prefers heavier brush with loamy gravels and more shade.

Despite the obvious calcium carbonate content the soils we've analyzed tend to be neutral or fairly close to it and mildly alkaline with an organic component of only a few percent. I've come to believe most people keep many of their cactus species in far too rich of a soil mix.

Echinata would do well enough if wildcrafted in williamsii habitat but williamsii will eventually die in echinata habitat due to the combination of lengthy droughts and Winter lows. Rain can be extremely intense in both ecosystems but good drainage and a sloping surface is true for both.

When grown in garden beds together echinata is commonly reported to survive cold spells that kill all of the williamsii.

South Texas gets really hot in Summer but, while freezing does occur there, it is generally fairly mild in Winter -- its known to have briefly reached as low as -12ºC (10ºF) at Rio Grande City and Roma (several degrees warmer at Zapata and Laredo) but not in 50 years -- whereas West Texas and adjacent northern Mexico experience hard freezes every year - some of which can be prolonged.

The US has experienced seriously crazy cold events but not in any of our lifetimes. Over a century ago ice was twice reported to have flowed out of the Mississippi into the Gulf at New Orleans. Europe experienced what was called the "Little Ice Age". Peyote's range was very likely decreased during that time period but it obviously survived in some places.

A lot of people might not realize that the peak warming period following the last glacial melting appears to have already occurred -- around a thousand years ago.

I'm still unclear if fasciation and cristation are the result of the genes of those plants or arises from something pathogenic which is capable of altering the apical meristem. I tend to lean towards the latter view. Many cristate plants are sterile and I do not know of any coming true from seeds,

There was a discussion here a while back on aberrent terminal events.

Edited April 1, 2012 by trucha

[woof woof woof]

Trucha,... are you maybe confusing 'the little ice age" with "the year without a summer"

Little Ice Age; It is conventionally defined as a period extending from the 16th to the 19th centuries,^[3][4][5] though climatologists and historians working with local records no longer expect to agree on either the start or end dates of this period, which varied according to local conditions. NASA defines the term as a cold period between 1550 AD and 1850 AD and notes three particularly cold intervals: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Little_Ice_Age#Climate_patterns

Year without a summer; http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Year_Without_a_Summer

Or did you mean freak weather events in the 1800's?

The reason's I'm interested; never thought to look deeper into hurricane events on the island I live on. 1877 - 1886 - 1892 were if I remember correctly La nina years.... and those were the only years the island got hit with hurricanes. Never got one withing 70 kilometers after that.

The other reason I'm interested is that I am hoping that LW can grow here in the wild. Average rainfall is 553 mm and the yearround temp is between 32C and 25C. We have years that we can reach up to 1000 mm of rain,..,... the LW's didnt like that,.... but not all died,.... so that is what i'm betting on.

[trucha]

I meant that freak 1800s period in terms of New Orleans and the Mississippi freezing. No one here was recording temperatures prior to the invasion. Thanks for correcting me on the rest of that. I easily confuse words and concepts sometimes anymore.

I'm really fascinated with weather events and the reality being long term instability being perceived by me having a lifespan of some decades.

There is no reason to think lw can't grow a number of places in the world. Especially if this form of it is chosen for the more challenging possibilities. As long as rates of new incorporation from seeds produced meets or exceeds death from drought or freezing long term establishment should work fine. In nature every Lw I've seen was growing in rocky or gravelly soil on a sloping surface. That goes far towards dealing with lots of rain when they get it. Some years it does rain a lot and gets to flood levels so is not far from what you decribed.

Edited April 2, 2012 by trucha

[woof woof woof]

gravelly soil & slopes are plentiful here..... it's only the 3 or 4 days of rain without much sun that worries me the most. Only one way to find out!

and yes,... weather events choke my chicken too! ;-)

[AlbertKLloyd]

. In nature every Lw I've seen was growing in rocky or gravelly soil on a sloping surface. That goes far towards dealing with lots of rain when they get it.

 

Excelent information as always.

I am reminded of Trichocereus, they often have very wet winters where they grow but are also found on rocky slopes and planted on stone walls as you know. The free draining environment prevents waterlogging when there is more than a meter of rain in the coldest times of the year.

Lophophora as you know also endure wetter conditions during the colder times of the year in much of their native range. Often people who cultivate them suggest keeping them dry in the winter and wet in the summer, but as you have also pointed out they tend to be grown in richer soils in terms of cultivation and this can pose a challenge in terms of mimicing the environmental conditions they originate in. With a mineral based substrate such cold and wet conditions are far less problematic than they would be with a substrate that contains more organic matter.

Trout, if you do not mind my asking, what neutralizes the native substrates they grow in?

Despite being Ca rich you have related they are often near neutral in pH, is this due to humic acid from the breakdown of their host plants litter?

[trucha]

I do not know on the alkalinity question. It might not be neutraization. Lots of it probably involves rain water simply carrying the more basic soluble components away to a lower region of the soil. Layers of caliche commonly exist from some inches to a few feet deep due to that migration.

Growing on slopes also prevents cold pockets of air forming around the plants by giving the cold air someplace else to go.

Living in beds peyote tends to have little problem with a surprising amount of wet and cold. In pots its more problematic. How much of that is soil and how much is the container I do not know.

Edited April 3, 2012 by trucha

[trucha]

Woof Woof Woof, 3-4 days of pouring rain with no sun is something Lophophora experiences in the wild also so it sounds like you should have successes.

[irabionist]

I really hope you kissed those crests when you left them so beautiful