Turb ? & unknown seedling ID help

[Jox]

Hi all,

I have a couple of seedlings here that I am trying to ID, I have waited for them to start to show some adult traits to make it a bit easier but they are still young & have never flowered. I realize I may have to wait for flowers to be 100% certain but any suggestions would be appreciated.

Number 1, I have about 20 of these & they came out of a pack of mixed Turbinicarpus seed. I am thinking it may be T.knuthianus but would like to hear your thoughts.

Number 2, this one has had me smiling & scratching my head at the same time as it came from a seed shop in Italy which sell some very cool & rare cactus. It came out of a pack of Ariocarpus seed & is obviously not an Ario (all the other seeds that germinated were Arios). It is starting to look like a Eriosyce possible E.esmeraldana but I really have know clue.

Thanks for looking.

Cheers

Jox

[prier]

Turbinicarpus horripilus (one of the gymnocactus group, so it gets big) second is a Copiapoa seedling probably C. humilis (too young to tell)

[Jox]

Hey prier, thanks for your reply mate .

I am keen to know how confident you are with your answers? I would have to agree that the names you provided could very well fit these young cacti but you type them like your certain "T.horripilus , second is a Copiapoa". If you are certain can you please point out to me how you worked them out. I do agree that the little Turb falls in the Gymnocactus group but how to be sure if it is T.Knuthianus or T. horripilus or one of the others at this age has got me beat, I was thinking I would need a flower to be positive. The second could very likely be a Copiapoa possibly C. humilis or C.tenuissima or another but once again how to be sure it is a Copiapoa & not anything else has me beat. Please tell me your secrets mate, I am always keen to better my ID skills .

Cheers

Jox

[prier]

I'm not always right but I have worked full time in horticulture at a specialist cacti and succulent nursery for over seven years. I also have access to an extremely comprehensive library.
I wrote Turbinicarpus horripilus because that's what your seedling looks like and it is the most common Gymnocactus in Aus. The Copiapoa could be something else it might be an Eriosyce but I doubt it as these are not very common.

[Jox]

Cool mate, nothing beats hands on experience.

I will keep posting update every few months of the Copiapoa / Eriosyce / Whoknows , until we work it out. The best thing about it is it came from a pack of seeds that I bought from an very large international seed shop which sells a lot of very hard to come by cactus, so it could be anything .

Cheers

Jox

[mutant]

I like the Eriosyce suggestion, but it looks as well as some Copiapoa, notably tenuissima.

Awesome suggestions prier!

Edited February 1, 2014 by mutant

[Jox]

Well the Turb in question flowered for me today.

@prier, it looks like T. horripilus fits (other than radials) so thank you for your suggestion . There is one question that I had about this, when I look at a key for Turbinicarpus it says that T.horripilus has 8 to 10 radial spines, my plants have a lot more than that. My question is, would it have more radials because it is a young plant or does it fall under the name T.horripilus ssp. wrobelianus which has more radials? Look forward to hearing your thoughts.

Here are some photos.

Cheers

Jox

EDIT; that is a 5 cent piece in the photo for size reference, just forgot to place it facing up .

Edited February 23, 2014 by Jox

[prier]

Where did you find the Turb key? just had a look through the new lexicon, they don't list any sub species. Also had a flick through two other books on turbs that don't even mention horripilus.
The plant we grow we call Gymnocactus horripilus var. goldii, that name just came with the plant and we've been growing it for years. We usually grow new plants from offsets so I'm not sure about seedling spines. It is fairly common for Cacti to have different immature and mature spination.

[Jox]

Hey prier, thanks for your reply.

I found the Turb key by typing in "key for the Turbinicarpus species" it is the first one that comes up by demon.co.uk, sorry I have know idea how to add links. If you look at this page & look click on T. horripilus there is a list of related Turbs at the bottom of the page, here is the key for t.horripilus wrobelianus.

After looking at the flower what are your thoughts?

Cheers

Jox

[prier]

Definitely looks like a T. horripilus flower to me. Just had a look at the key you mentioned. "This key is based on keys from "A revision of the genus Turbinicarpus", CASJ(US),49(4):1977, by Charles Glass and Robert Foster, Las Cactáceas De México by Helia Bravo-Hollis and Hernando Sánchez-Mejorada and A revision of the genus Neolloydiaby E. F. Anderson."

There has been a lot of work done on Turbinicarpus since 1977.

[Jox]

The key was done in 2007, as it says "this key is based on". If you read through it you would see most of the information is current and is base on newer findings.

Anyway I am just trying to put a tag on this plant, I agree that horripilus fits best. I will add more photos when it as put on some more growth.

Thanks again for your help prier.

Cheers

Jox

[prier]

Weird as "Knowing, understanding, growing Turbinicarpus - Rapicactus" by David Donati and Carlo Zanovella was released in 2005, they go through all known taxa and have no reference to varieties or subspecies of horripilus.

[Jox]

Weird as "Knowing, understanding, growing Turbinicarpus - Rapicactus" by David Donati and Carlo Zanovella was released in 2005, they go through all known taxa and have no reference to varieties or subspecies of horripilus.

I don't understand what you mean by this.

Can you recommend sites,book etc that are being used by the majority to name there plants. The thing I find most frustrating about naming cacti is that it still seems to be undergoing a lot of change & no one seems to agree. As a collector & not an expert I would just like it if there was a Cactus King who new all the facts & everyone agreed that way I look at his book & know for sure whats going on.

Cheers

Jox

[prier]

There will always to disagreements in cacti taxonomy. Currently i am using "The New Cactus Lexicon" as my cacti bible.
"Originally published in 2006, this two-volume work ('NCL' for short) is the first scientifically authoritative conspectus of the Cactaceae since Britton & Rose's famous monograph nearly a century ago and the benchmark reference for everyone with an interest in the diversity, identification and conservation of cacti." - http://www.newcactuslexicon.org/

[mutant]

there will always be disagreements in taxonomy period.

people who dont care about what taxonomy is about will always be sheep waiting for the experts to tell them the true classification.

"500 Cacti: Species and Varieties in Cultivation" by Ken Preston-Mafham

is a modern, cheap, small and practical in size book with awesome photos and pretty accurate if you ask me. I definately recommend you buy this. I think I got this for 7 or 10 euros. Most of all the writter is an expert (lots of experience in the field, it seems) with great respect for current taxonomy changes and reasoning between these changes. But despite this fact, he accepts or rejects the current tendency in his own work, depending on if the change makes sense to him.

Lots of talk in this book about different forms of varied species and intermediate forms between two "good" species.

In all its limitations as far as the species list go (500 species) , this is the best book on cacti I have and keep going back to it.

I read "cactus lexicon" merges parodia, notocactus and echinopsis (including trichos) ?

and since it costs some 170 euros, I'd better stay with the e-version.

[prier]

Ya the new lexicon does bring together Parodia and Notocactus, but that was done ages ago. Also Trichocereus, Soerhensia, Helianothcereus and Echinopsis have been grouped into Echinopsis for ages too.
No one book is correct, this is just the best thing we currently have on offer.
Backeberg's "Cactus Lexicon", Borg's "Cacti" and Britton and Rose's "The Cactaceae" are very good books if you're interested in Cactus Taxonomic History, but they're really no longer useful. Also Anderson's "The Cactus Family" is pretty good if you can get a cheap copy.
Really you shoulod be buying specific books for specific genera if you want the real goods.

[Jack]

"Knowing, understanding, growing Turbinicarpus - Rapicactus" by David Donati and Carlo Zanovella as mentioned previously is my Turbinicarpus bible.