Ferocactus emoryi(Engelm.) Orcutt

Emory's Barrel CactusEmory's barrel cactus

WFO wfo-0000686278 Accepted WFO 2026-06 8 photographs CC0 / CC BY

Plate 1 figs. a–h · 8 separate observations

Ferocactus emoryi, photographed by Craig Martin
fig. a Craig Martin, CC0 1.0 / 2022-02-25 / obs. 180664906
Ferocactus emoryi, photographed by Robbie Hannawacker
fig. b Robbie Hannawacker, CC0 1.0 / obs. 175867298
Ferocactus emoryi, photographed by Caleb Catto
fig. c Caleb Catto, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 177465015
Ferocactus emoryi, photographed by Caleb Catto
fig. d Caleb Catto, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 177465369
Ferocactus emoryi, photographed by Andrew Meeds
fig. e Andrew Meeds, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 175653236
Ferocactus emoryi, photographed by Tayton Alvis
fig. f Tayton Alvis, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 173330676
Ferocactus emoryi, photographed by Mike Duran
fig. g Mike Duran, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 136823422
Ferocactus emoryi, photographed by Isaac Krone
fig. h Isaac Krone, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 33761073

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 3 botanical countries

Regions where Ferocactus emoryi is native: Arizona, Mexico Northeast, Mexico Northwest ArizonaMexico NortheastMexico Northwest
Native distribution of Ferocactus emoryi, after Kew’s World Checklist of Vascular Plants. Introduced, extinct and doubtful records are excluded, so this is where the plant is from, not everywhere it now grows.
RegionTDWG codeContinent
Arizona ARI NORTHERN AMERICA
Mexico Northeast MXE
Mexico Northwest MXN

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 630 observations

Condition 5th percentile Median 95th percentile
Coldest month, mean daily low 4.7 °C 6.9 °C 13.7 °C
Warmest month, mean daily high 32.6 °C 37.9 °C 39.1 °C
Annual rainfall 187 mm 243 mm 383 mm
Rainfall in the driest quarter 3 mm 12 mm 18 mm

It is barely found anywhere that freezes. This is not care advice and it is not a forecast. It is a measurement: we sampled the climate at every one of the 630 research-grade observations of Ferocactus emoryi 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 8 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.

  • Echinocactus covillei (Britton & Rose) A.Berger
  • Echinocactus emoryi Engelm.
  • Echinocactus emoryi f. rectispinus (Engelm. ex J.M.Coult.) Schelle
  • Echinocactus emoryi var. rectispinus Engelm. ex J.M.Coult.
  • Echinocactus rectispinus (Engelm.) Britton & Rose
  • Ferocactus covillei Britton & Rose
  • Ferocactus emoryi var. rectispinus (Engelm.) N.P.Taylor
  • Ferocactus rectispinus (Engelm.) Britton & Rose

Sourcesevery claim on this page

  1. World Flora Online Plant List. accepted name, authority, classification. CC0. Retrieved 2026-07-12.
  2. iNaturalist. photographs and flowering annotations, CC0 / CC BY / CC BY-SA only. per photograph. Retrieved 2026-06-27.
  3. Wikidata. common name (P1843), joined on the World Flora Online identifier (P7715). CC0. Retrieved 2026-07-13.
  4. 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.