mammillaria crucigera ssp tlalocii

in these days new central spines are growing at the top of the plant...
fn is FO229..
the notes that i have are...
species: mammillaria elegans v.
locality: conpuerta, sierra mixteca, border oaxaca-pueblo, mexico
date: 14-may-88
notes: minute white spines, red flowers; M. tlalocii

I have the same plant, and it has just on the top some short dark central spines, rather shorter than those shwon in your photo, but otherwise very similar plant.
I also have several M. crugicera ssp grandinosa plants, one of which (if correctly named) also has some short central spines at the top.
On neither plant do the spines appear to last, as they are all at the very top of the plant.

.... and what can you tell me about fn ?
elegans.... tlalocii....

I'm not sure what you would like to know, Maurillo, but here goes.

M. elegans is a form, I believe, of M. haageana. Some authors give it species status, some subspecies or variety, and others (Hunt in the NCL) scrap all subspecies of M. haageana and just have a very variable species. According to Reppenhagn it inculdes M. sanangelensism dealbata, and acathophlegma. It comes from Morelos and Mexico states, no is a bit of a more northen form on the volcanic region of Mexico from other M. haageana forms. It typically has 2 central spines, of varying length, sometimes very short, but I believe they are persistant and they don't drop off. Its flowers arise from the usual position on the plant - on the upper part.

Now M. tlalocii is a form of M. crucigera, and comes from the border area between Puebla and Oaxaca states, so rather further south than elegans. It has much shorter spines than elegans, though on some plants (from different collections) they are more obvious than the description would suggest. The plants tend to be solitary. The flowers arise from the sides and appear just like crugigera flowers, a first sight of a bud peeping through, and very quickly after that the flower opens, pressed tight against the spines, very diferent from elegans.

M. crucigera ssp grandinosa, which is a form named for the Lacoste collection ML041 which he thought first to be M. meissneri, I think because of its clustering habit. It is very slow growing and its appearnce is like a darker flowered clustering tlalocii.

I can post some photos of my plants if that would help. Let me know.

if you search for field number FO 229 you can try m.elegans v.

Where are you looking? I have done a Google search and just find tlalocii in the first 3 pages anyway. I've tried on this Forum and can't find anything...??
In 2007 there was a discussion on the BCSS Forum in which I took part about a plant that was supposed to be FO229 but didn't look right, even though the flower position was right. There is was said that on Ralph Martin's Field Number data base FO-229 was listed as elegans v.
Reppenhagne named the plant from his Rep 901 collection in 1974. I don't know how widely known it was. It is possible that Felix Oteroi didn't recognise the plant he found and simply named it as a variety of M. elegans. Later it does seem to have been named as tlalocii. I have a list of FO field numbers which I was given by a German specialist (who doesn't post here unfortunately) and there is it written as FO229 tlalocii (elegans v ?).

my notes comes from " field number database of ralph martin".
there is written mammillaria elegans v. at fn FO229 as you write in your note.

I have 6 plants of M. tlalocii F)-229 (MG 928.32), they are about 12 years old. One of them has no centrals at all, 1 has less than 5 centrals, 2 others have an occasional central (see photo), 1 has a fairly large number of centrals, and one has many centrals (see photo; that one looks very elegans-like).
My 5 plants of M. tlalocii FO-223 (MG 928.3) and my 2 plants of M. tlalocii MG 928.2 do not have any central spines at all.

Wolter.

Like Wolter I have 6 plants of FO-229 and 6 plants of FO-223 all grown from seed from Mesa Gardens.
The FO-229's have all produced central spines randomly around the plant body while the FO-223's have produced no centrals at all, also the plant bodys are half the size of the FO-229's.
Plants of FO-229 that I obtained from Tony Irons seedlings ( Trade ) have also produced central spines.
I did see a large plant of F0-229 at a cactus show years ago which again had central spines all up the plant body so I do not believe the plant would lose them later in their life.

sept 29 , 2010
two beautiful plants FO 229 with central spines and flowers annastro.....
carlo zanovello collection