Tephrocactus

THE SUBGENUS TEPHROCACTUS O. darwinii Fig. 1. A historical survey with notes on cultivation by Gilbert Leighton-Boyce and James Iliff Published by the Succulent Plant Trust 63 The Drive, Morden, Surrey, England Copyright © G. G. Leighton-Boyce and James Iliff, 1973 Printed in Great Britain by Smart & Co. (Printers) Ltd., Brackley, Northants. ILLUSTRATIONS The photographs in this book were taken by S. L. Cooke, R. F. S. Dale, James Iliff, Gilbert Leighton-Boyce, Mrs. B. Maddams and Colin Waldeck. The reproduction of the Henslow drawing (engraved by Lizars) of O. darwinii is by courtesy of the Kew Herbarium, and the reproduction of Sanzin’s drawings of O. platyacantha and O. ovata is by courtesy of the British Museum (Natural History). The illustration of a plant near O. sphaerica was specially drawn for this book by Celia Palmer, and that of O. platyacantha (Fig. 77) by James Iliff. THE SUB-GENUS TEPHROCACTUS A historical survey with notes on cultivation by Gilbert Leighton-Boyce and James Iliff The Succulent Plant Trust 1973 CONTENTS page Preface and Acknowledgements … … … … … … 1 Introduction … … … … … … … … … 2 How the Tephrocacti got their name … … … … … … 2 The Lemaire Position … … … … … … … … 3 The Main 19th Century Foundation … … … … … … 3 Later and Greater Confusions … … … … … … … 4 The Historical Approach … … … … … … … 5 How to cultivate the plants … … … … … … … 7 The plants discussed in detail … … … … … … … 8 Illustrations: (Figs. 1-76) … … … … … … … … 10 O. floccosa group … … … … … … … … 44 Cultivation … … … … … … … … 46 O. pentlandii group … … … … … … … … 46 Cultivation … … … … … … … … 52 O. glomerata group … … … … … … … … 52 Cultivation … … … … … … … … 62 O. diademata group … … … … … … … … 64 Summary … … … … … … … … 75 Cultivation … … … … … … … … 76 O. sphaerica group … … … … … … … … 77 Cultivation … … … … … … … … 81 O. corrugata group … … … … … … … … 82 Cultivation … … … … … … … … 84 Unassigned Plants … … … … … … … … 85 Cultivation … … … … … … … … 97 Envoi … … … … … … … … … … … 97 Postscript and Fig. 77 … … … … … … … … … 98 Bibliography … … … … … … … … … … 99 Index of Persons … … … … … … … … … … 101 Index of Plants … … … … … … … … … … 103 Preface and Acknowledgements We have been studying this particular sort of cactus Department and the General Library of the British since early in the fifties, and have found ourselves Museum (Natural History) and, of course, the Her- compelled to formulate our own reference book by barium and Library of the Royal Botanic Gardens, the inadequacy of the existing literature. We do not Kew. We could not have written this book without claim to have read all the references, many of them handling (if that is the word here) a large quantity of buried in stray paragraphs in general works on succu- living plant material, some from fellow collectors lent plants long out of print and in articles in journals like Mr. R. Ginns, who has been most encouraging now equally rare. We are conscious of gaps in our and kindness itself, and some from good friends in knowledge of work done in Japan and in some South the trade. We cannot possibly thank them all here American countries. But we had found enough in- by name, though some are mentioned later in the formation omitted from, or sometimes misleadingly text. We believe that very few of the major collect- summarised in the recent general books to feel that ions of succulent plants in this country are at present it might be helpful to further study of this minor run by anyone having a special understanding of this subject to put together this book. The references we unusual sort of cactus, but there are several nursery- quote have been checked by one or other of us but in men who maintain their own collections as well as a number of cases not by both, owing to pressure selling some of the plants and a few of them are of other commitments. Otherwise, the book has been really very knowledgeable in this field. Interest in the very much a joint undertaking in equal partnership. particular plants has also been stimulated in recent We would place on record here our thanks for years in this country by lectures by Messrs. David their courtesy and patience to those in charge of the Hunt, Len Newton and Gordon Rowley and the tour Linnaean Society Library, the Lindley Library of the of the late Curt Backeberg with some of his splendid Royal Horticultural Society, the Botany School, Cam- slides. bridge, the Herbarium and Library of the Botanical INTRODUCTION Of all the sub-families of the Cactaceae, the Opun- often difficult terrain in more detail, they concen- tioideae have the greatest range in terms of latitude, trated on other and more superficially interesting the natural habitat stretching from Canada to Pata- prizes. The splendid Flora Chilena (Vol. 3, 1847) has gonia. They have escaped successfully after human only ovata, longispina, glomerata, poeppigii, maihuen, introduction and established themselves wild in ovallei, andicola, platyacantha and tuberosa of the Southern Europe, Africa, India and Australasia. They plants that are within our field or stand near to it. survive in conditions quite remote from those gener- To this day, there are a number of likely areas not ally accepted as characteristic for the family as a visited by any field botanists or others with sufficient whole. In a Russian newspaper in March 1969, a experience to identify possibly new plants which grow writer noted that some flowered and fruited after in low mounds generally, and very close to their wintering under snow, with a minimum temperature rocky soil. So one can say with confidence that the down to minus 22 centigrade. Survival of intense heat tally of the Tephrocacti cannot yet be counted. This and prolonged aridity is recorded from many coun- may also be true of the very small flat-padded tries. Everybody knows the prickly pear, and the Opuntiae (Airampoae) which exist over a significant genus Opuntia is probably the most fully documented part of the same range and are equally low growing. of all the genera of cacti, and not only from the These are dwarf relatives of the big bushy prickly botanic point of view. It appears, for example, in pears, and similarly the Tephrocacti may be envisaged plate one of Hogarth’s Analysis of Beauty, 1753. loosely as among the miniature relatives of the tree- Having been a decisive factor in at least one North like or bushy cylindrical Opuntiae: but a statement American battle, having very nearly at one stage of this crudity does no justice to the astonishing ruined the development of major tracts of Australia, variability of the forms and sizes in which Opuntiae the Opuntia has its place in history, quite apart from grow. It is also important to realize at an early stage its own somewhat chequered career as an economic that small races of Opuntia have evolved differently plant in the Canary Islands and elsewhere. Yet in widely separated regions. We are concerned in despite this, virtually nothing appears to have been this book with a geographically linked range of plants written until well into the 19th century about a and must turn away from the many fascinating, in- whole distinctive range of these plants stretching deed superbly spined species of North America such right down from the Western side of the Andes in as clavata and schottii which differ so much in their Peru and across to the Eastern side and down as organisation and spination and the consistently far as Patagonia, a matter of some 4,000 miles. The clavate rather than ovoid shape of their segments, explanation is, first, that the high tablelands which growing generally in a step-like formation so as to they particularly favour were largely unexplored and, form a looser mat rather than a compacted clump. second, that, when they were, other and more spec- They cannot (questions of geography apart) be treated tacular phenomena seemed more worthy of attention. as Tephrocacti without robbing the term of any Even when plant hunters began to cover the vast and meaningful status. How the Tephrocacti got their name L. Pfeiffer was in 1837 the first to distinguish some be the Cinderellas of many cactus collections. of the key Tephrocactus material of the diademata Lemaire was one of a number of contemporary group from Opuntia. He marked this not by a new botanists in Europe who took up the Cactaceae as genus but by publishing three of his descriptions they became fashionable in the enormous conserva- under Cereus in a new section “Opuntiacei”. A tories and glasshouses of the wealthy in the 19th Professor of Botany at Ghent named Charles Lemaire century, and he was the author of many original is the man who appears to have invented the name: descriptions: indeed he seems to have engaged in a certainly, he was the first to seek to establish it sort of international academic competition in this botanically. He explained the derivation as from regard which was, in those days, conducted by Tephra, the Classical Greek word for ashes, particu- reference to fairly limited numbers of imported larly the ashes of mourning and of the funeral pyre, plants, often of very uncertain provenance. Dupli- and, of course, cactus, the old Linnaean name for cation of descriptions was bound to occur and was various species of Cactaceae known in Europe in his frequently denied with great vigour, and a number day. of dubious minor distinctions began to be elevated The name seems not inappropriate, because al- beyond their reasonable significance. This process though fresh vegetative growth is purple

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