The World Flora Online

Trees or shrubs, erect, arching, or procumbent, mostly branched from base. Roots adventitious if plant procumbent. Stems unsegmented, often more narrow at branch bases and where showing growth increments, green to bluish green [or whitish from surface wax or purple tinged from pigment], columnar, ribbed, [50-]100-500+ × [5-](9-)11-18[-20] cm; ribs 4-20, rounded, margins nearly flat to sinusoidal or strongly tuberculate, with transverse folds between areoles or not; areoles 0.5-2.5 cm apart, circular to horizontally elliptic, young hairs whitish or tan to reddish brown, aging darker; areolar glands present or absent; cortex mucilaginous or not, mucilage throughout and slippery or restricted to sacs in outer cortex, green to white or yellowish; pith mucilaginous or not, 1-8 cm wide. Spines to 28 per areole, hemispherically arranged, initially rose to magenta, becoming darker or fading to grayish white, relatively thin and brittle to stout and very hard; radial spines to 3.5 cm; central spines usually weakly defined or absent, sometimes broad and downward pointing, to 7.5 cm. Flowers diurnal or nocturnal, produced only once on areole [or not], terminal to lateral, funnelform [to tubular]; flower tubes2-11 cm; outer tepals with dark green to purplish centers but light margins, margins entire; inner tepals white to rose-red [or yellow]; ovary globose to barrel-shaped, similar to locule shape; scales persistent, reddish or green with red tips, small, triangular; hairs and spines often present; stigma lobes 5-15, inserted or exserted; nectar chamber open. Fruits indehiscent or sometimes splitting irregularly, dark red to purplish green or green, spheric [to ovoid], 30-100 mm, fleshy to juicy [or somewhat dry], bearing deciduous spine clusters; pulp red, special pigment cells present; floral remnant persistent or deciduous. Seeds brownish black or black, oblong to subspheric with oblique hilum, 0.7-3 mm, dull or rarely glossy; testa cells convex or nearly flat, with prominent to faint, raised waxy striations or not. x = 11.

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STENOCEREUS (A. Berger) Riccob.

Stenocereus eichlamii (Britton & Rose) Buxb. ex Bravo, Cact. México, ed. 2, 1: 585. 1978; Lemaireocereus eichlamii Britton & Rose; Cereus laevigatus var. guatemalensis Eichlam.

Arborescentes, erectos, columnares, 5–8 m de alto, con pocas ramas, costillas 8–10, 8–12 cm de diámetro; aréolas afelpadas, con 3–6 espinas aciculares de 6–20 mm de largo, grises. Flores 6–7 cm de largo; tubo receptacular 1.5–2 cm de largo, perianto persistente; partes sepaloides del perianto verde-purpúreas; partes petaloides del perianto petaloide 1–1.5 cm de largo, rojo-purpúreas. Frutos ovoides, ca 7 cm de largo al madurar, rojos, aréolas con escamas y felpa café; semillas negras.

Conocida en Nicaragua por una sola colección (Stevens 9094) de bosques secos, deciduos, Estelí; 800 m; fl y fr jun; sur de México a Nicaragua. Aun quedan algunas dudas de que si S. eichlamii es verdaderamente distinto de S. laevigatus (Salm-Dyck) Buxb. Un género con ca 20 especies distribuidas desde México hasta Colombia y Venezuela y también en las Antillas.

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Shrubs or small trees, with erect, columnar branches; stems cylindrical, with 9-14 longitudinal ribs; areoles along margins usually felted, surrounded by clusters of spines and lacking glochids. Leaves wanting. Flowers solitary, sessile and bell- to funnelshaped, with long hypanthium; outer perianth segments scale-like; inner segments petaloid; stamens numerous, inserted on hypanthium; ovary medial, the style stout. Fruit wide ellipsoid to globose, spiny at first but the spines deciduous, with numerous exarillate, black seeds.

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A genus of 25 species, distributed from southwestern United States to Mexico, the Greater Antilles and northern South America. Reference: Kiesling, R. 1982. Problemas nomenclaturales en el genero Cereus (Cactaceae).

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SELECTED REFERENCES

Cornejo, D. O. and B. B. Simpson. 1997. Analysis of form and function in North American columnar cacti (tribe Pachycereae). Amer. J. Bot. 84: 1482-1501. Gibson, A. C. 1988. The systematics and evolution of subtribe Stenocereinae. 1. Composition and definition of the subtribe. Cact. Succ. J. (Los Angeles) 60: 11-16. Gibson, A. C. 1990. The systematics and evolution of subtribe Stenocereinae. 8. Organ pipe cactus and its closest relatives. Cact. Succ. J. (Los Angeles) 62: 13-24. Gibson, A. C. and K. E. Horak. 1978. Systematic anatomy and phylogeny of Mexican columnar cacti. Ann. Missouri Bot. Gard. 65: 999-1057. Parker, K. C. 1987. Seedcrop characteristics and minimum reproductive size of organ pipe cactus (Stenocereus thurberi) in southern Arizona. Madroño 34: 294-303. Parker, K. C. 1987b. Site-related demographic patterns of organ pipe cactus populations in southern Arizona. Bull. Torrey Bot. Club 114: 149-155.

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