rhodantha? polythele?

Hello,

I'm new here. I'm living in France where I grow cactius and succulents on a balcony. They grow outside all over the year and I protect them from the rain.
For my first post, I need your help to identify this MAMMILLARIA:



Thanks for your help.

Tistou :-)

Hi Tistou,

Welcome to the forum. I believe this plant is M.rhodantha. The spine colour in this species tends to vary from golden - yellow has in the wonderful Rog 630 form to the more common red - brown has in your plant above.
M.polythele tends to have more darker gray - black spines, althought I do have a nice red - brown form of M ssp obconella.

Tam.

Thanks for welcome. A friend af mine gave me this plant with rhodantha name, but I think it's a polythele?

[/url]

This one is polythele?


[/url]
Thanks.

Tistou :-)

Hi,
The easiest way of telling whether a plant belongs to the polythele group or the rhodantha group is to look at the radial spines. Plants of the polythele group don't have any, or if they do they soon vanish.
The plants in your photo all have radial spines, even on older areoles, so I think they all would be rhodantha group plants, if they are "pure" species, or maybe hybrids.

So it would be all rhodantha (or hybrids).
Thank you for your help.

Tistou :-)