We said
'see you again' to Bart & Marijke, may be in March in the Netherlands
when Angie & I will be shown around many Dutch nurseries by
Leo; may be not until September, at ELK in Belgium, or else in Chile
in November 2007.
The two car convoy made it to
the Copec petrol station at the Vallenar crossroads junction on Ruta
5. Lack of 'motion lotion' had been one reason for turning back at
Labrar yesterday, instead of carrying on to Caleta Sarco. Missing out
on El Sarco sort of niggled me. I can't quite remember whose
suggestion it was, but in any event, we turned west at Domeyko as
there was no point in taking two cars, parked Florencia's car and made
sure that they were comfortable, squatting in the back of the pick up,
as Angie & my luggage had been dumped on the back seat.
We stopped some kilometres
further, for a place (S599) that was very special to Juan & Florencia,
a location of Eriosyce napina ssp tenebrica (syn. E.
fankhauserii). Thanks to them we
had been shown many Eriosyce, particularly Thelocaphala. I'm aware
that the subgenus name has changed, but not yet why, and as I like the
old name, and believe that most readers know what I mean by it, I'll
stick with it for now. These are plants that are best examined on a
large computer screen, from digital images taken with a good macro
lens. Swapping over to my reading glasses every few minutes in the
field simply was not an option. So Angie & I have collected many
'names'; have many great images, but struggle to match them with each
other. Fortunately Florencia is visiting us in England next week and
can rectify the matter, so that when I come to publishing the
illustrated Diaries on the website, these plants will have their
correct, even if controversial, names.
We learned that the trick in
finding these cryptic plants was not to look for the plant itself, but
for the relatively large, often woolly / bristly fruit, that seems to
be designed for wind dispersal. Its regular elliptical shape is easier
to spot in angular gravel. When found, there is a good chance that
there will be at least one plant in a 2 meter radius from the fruit.
This may sound rather laborious, but works, and at least you end up
with seed, if it hasn't all fallen out of the fruit by the time you've
picked it up.
We carried on towards
Carrizalillo, until we found the turning sign pointing west to Sarco.
About 1 km further we stopped, as Juan wanted to check for
Thelocephala - Eriosyce napina ssp tenebrica, that were duly found (S600), in fruit. Our sprawling
Eulychnia 'hairy acida' was around again, in flower, as was
Cumulopuntia sphaerica (so common that it rarely gets a mention,
although we saw it in most places) in flower, and Miqueliopuntia
miquelii, in flower. Angie, as usual, went off in the opposite
direction. There's no point in both of us coming home with the same
pictures. As I'm writing today's report (a few days in advance) I'm in
correspondence with Rudolf about the out of character white waxed C. coquimbana that we had found yesterday. I mentioned this to Angie over
breakfast and she switched on her laptop to show me pictures of what
she saw at S600 - white waxed coquimbanas! Here only about a third of
the plants that she found on her hillside had this feature. It seemed
that the higher up on the hill, the more white waxed plants there were
and the more prominent the wax. She never got to the top of the hill,
as I honked the horn to gather the troops to move on.
The track was getting worse by
the minute, until some 14 km from S600, with only some 6 km to go to
the coast; we decided that it was unlikely that things would improve.
I now knew what to expect next year, when I want to come back here,
get to the coast and try to connect with the track to Labrar to
establish the alternative route to Huasco.
We decided to spend some time
here (S601) and then go back to Domeyko and Ruta 5. There were some
nice Copiapoa coquimbana, no wax, but nice flowers, and
Eriosyce heinrichiana.
Back on Ruta 5, it did not take
long to reach El Trapiche, where Juan waved us in to a track that led
to the east and a spot to park. (S602) 'What are we looking for?' 'Eriosyce.'
'Which ones?' Eriosyce napina ssp riparia (syn. E. napina 'Trapiche'
= E. tenebrica?) and E. heinrichiana forma 'Trapiche'. This time they were no
challenge as the plants were in flower all around us. It was
interesting to see both spineless juvenile forms and spined adult
forms, but both in flower. Copiapoa coquimbana was also present and in
flower and a disappointing Eulychnia. Why disappointing? Until now I
had only found 'hairy acida' fruits on sprawling plants, two
characteristics that set it aside of the usually upright, 'bald
scales' acida plants. But here, the hairy fruits were on 2 m (6 ft)
tall, upright stems.
Time to move on again, with the
last stop of the day at our usual stop at Los Hornos (S603). A police
car was pulling over cars that colleagues had spotted earlier speeding
down the Cuesta. They were quite surprised when we pulled in without
being summoned, and waved at them. They smiled and probably thought
'We'll get you next time.'
Just to prove a point, the
Eulychnia that I had seen on at least 7 previous visits here, were
showing off their buds, flowers and fruits. The plants were all
growing straight up. The pericarpel / fruit was 'hairy acida'. How
come that I had not noticed this before? I could kick myself! I guess
that these plants are just so common and appear everywhere that
Copiapoa are found, that you forget to look at details such as pericarpel and fruit characteristics.
