Mexico Field Trip

Day 9 – February 22^nd, 2005

 

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Today was billed by Norbert during breakfast as an “exploration day”, meaning that he didn’t have set locations for us to check out, rather we would explore areas to which he had not previously been.

 

We left the hotel after breakfast at 07:50 and took the same route out as yesterday – from the hotel 1^st right, then right again and straight up Avenida Morelos. Then left on Tinoco y Palacios, right onto Hidalgo up to the top, and then turn right onto a dual carriageway until at the main roundabout we took the Mexico direction road. At the next junction we went right,  following a sign for “Hotel Victoria”. Because the road signs are so bad, this seemed to be the most obvious indication. It’s a much clearer day than yesterday, few clouds and little wind, so we must expect it to be hot. So far, this is the same route as to Mitla yesterday.

 

Eventually we came to a junction marked Tuxtapec and MEX 175 and turned left onto it. It seemed a nice dual carriageway towards the mountains, but it soon ended and became the usual twisty road climbing upwards. As we gained height, we came into an area of dense woodland, leafy trees as well as the scrub to which we were more used. The occasional Jacaranda tree added colour. Over and upwards into the mountains, and then we started to descend. There seemed to be some disagreement between Michel and Norbert, so we turned round and retraced our route until a stop to view a large Tillandsia area, and then we returned all the way back to Oaxaca, across the south of the city, and eventually onto MEX 131 through Zimatlan heading for San Miguel Mixtepec.

 

However, we actually ended up at San Miguel de Vega, not having found the turning that we had wanted. The slopes were very steep and shaly, quite wooded, and there were a number of white spined Mammillarias, with single central spines, probably some kind of M. albilanata (?). They were in flower, which was nice, and at a height between 5700 and 5900 ft. The flowers were red, rather than pink, and the forms relatively flat rather than cylindrical, although this could well have been the age of the plants in that place.

 

PICT1456-68    -           Mammillaria albilanata forms

 

Quite a bit further on the road to the coast, at 5662 ft, we stopped after a village called Sola de Vega. A path led up from a tight bend in the road, and the plants we found were both in sun and semi shade, being a mixed pine and oak forest. There were varied forms of Mammillaria albilanata, some very woolly and some with little wool. Those in flower were the woollier kinds, and the flowers were quite pink, which was in marked contrast to those seen at the earlier stop. Clearly there is considerable variation in flower colour as well as spination, in what according to Pilbeam can only be Mammillaria albilanata ssp. oaxacana, unless the distribution of other subspecies – especially ssp. albilanata is much wider than documented.

 

PICT1469-74    -           Mammillaria albilanata forms

PICT1475,7      -           Close ups of Mammillaria albilanata flower

PICT1478         -           Mammillara albilanata – ignota form.

PICT1479-80    -           Mammillaria albilanata

 

A bit further on, and after a stop for a drink from a roadside shop, just around the corner in fact from there, we saw some amazing Tillandisas, densely clothing the trees. There were Agaves and other succulent plants there as well, making it seem almost semi-tropical, but clearly the air gained moisture from the sea.

 

PICT1481-6      -           Agaves, Tillandsias, and views of the area.

 

In a while further on, I saw what I thought were some green Mammillarias, but they turned out in fact to be wild bees nests, cone shaped in the rocks beside the road. But there were as well, many white spined and woolly Mammillarias with pink flowers. This was just before Santa Ana.

 

PICT1487 -8     -           The hillside where these plants were seen.

 

We drove on a bit, but decided that we had gone far enough for the day, and turned round, making a stop again at the site of these white spined plants.

 

PICT1489-92    -           Views from the car of the land we were travelling through.

PICT1493-1501 -           Mammillaria albilanata forms.

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