Plate 1 figs. a–h · 6 observations
This species has been photographed under an open licence only 6 times, so some figures below are different views of the same plant, taken on the same day, rather than different individuals. They are usually different parts of it: the leaf, the flower, the bark.
Every figure is a research-grade observation under CC0, CC BY or CC BY-SA, rehosted with the photographer’s name, the licence and the observation it came from. Photographs under a NonCommercial licence are excluded from this site and are never stored, which costs us a great many pictures and is not negotiable.
Native range 2 botanical countries
| Region | TDWG code | Continent |
|---|---|---|
| Argentina Northwest | AGW | SOUTHERN AMERICA |
| Bolivia | BOL |
Region boundaries approximated from Natural Earth (public domain) and mapped to TDWG World Geographical Scheme for Recording Plant Distributions (WGSRPD) level-3 botanical countries (Brummitt 2001). Indicative, not the official WGSRPD geometry.
Where it actually grows measured, from 79 observations
| Condition | 5th percentile | Median | 95th percentile |
|---|---|---|---|
| Coldest month, mean daily low | -2.2 °C | 2.5 °C | 5.2 °C |
| Warmest month, mean daily high | 13.6 °C | 18.8 °C | 22.1 °C |
| Annual rainfall | 497 mm | 816 mm | 1,983 mm |
| Rainfall in the driest quarter | 5 mm | 16 mm | 122 mm |
It is found where winters bring light frost. This is not care advice and it is not a forecast. It is a measurement: we sampled the climate at every one of the 79 research-grade observations of Austrocylindropuntia vestita that carry a coordinate, and this is the range those places actually span. The 5th and 95th percentiles are used rather than the minimum and maximum, because a single cultivated specimen in a heated conservatory should not widen a tropical plant's range to the Arctic.
This is not a hardiness zone. A USDA zone is the average annual extreme minimum temperature. The figure above is the mean daily minimum of the coldest month, which is a different quantity and is typically far warmer. Reading one as the other would place a plant several zones too warm, so we do not publish a hardiness zone, because we do not have one.
Also published as 20 synonyms
A synonym is not an error. It is a record of botanists disagreeing, in print, about where this plant belongs. Each of these was somebody’s considered answer.
- Austrocylindropuntia chuquisacana (Cárdenas) F.Ritter
- Austrocylindropuntia heteromorpha (Phil.) Batov
- Austrocylindropuntia teres (F.Cels ex F.A.C.Weber) Backeb.
- Austrocylindropuntia vestita var. chuquisacana (Cárdenas) Backeb.
- Austrocylindropuntia vestita var. intermedia Backeb.
- Austrocylindropuntia vestita var. maior Backeb.
- Cylindropuntia teres (Cels ex F.A.C.Weber) Backeb.
- Cylindropuntia vestita (Salm-Dyck) Backeb.
- Opuntia chuquisacana Cárdenas
- Opuntia heteromorpha Phil.
- Opuntia involuta Otto ex C.F.Först.
- Opuntia teres Cels ex F.A.C.Weber
- Opuntia vestita Salm-Dyck
- Opuntia vestita f. intermedia (Backeb.) Krainz
- Opuntia vestita f. maior (Backeb.) Krainz
- Opuntia vestita var. chuquisacana (Cárdenas) G.D.Rowley
- Pseudotephrocactus vestitus (Salm-Dyck) Frič & Schelle
- Pseudotephrocactus vestitus (Salm-Dyck) Frić
- Tephrocactus heteromorphus (Phil.) Backeb.
- Trichopuntia vestita (Salm-Dyck) Guiggi
Sourcesevery claim on this page
- World Flora Online Plant List. accepted name, authority, classification. CC0. Retrieved 2026-07-12.
- iNaturalist. photographs and flowering annotations, CC0 / CC BY / CC BY-SA only. per photograph. Retrieved 2026-06-27.
- Kew, World Checklist of Vascular Plants (WCVP v16). native distribution by TDWG level-3 botanical country, and life form. CC BY 3.0. Retrieved 2026-06-04.
We publish what we can source and we say so when we cannot. This page has no care advice and no toxicity claim, because we do not yet have those from a source we can cite.