One of the highlights of our stay in South America was when we stepped off the plane in Santiago de Chile and immediately recognised our good pen-friend Friedrich Ritter, who had come to collect us in his faithful Ford-pickup.

As neither Ritter, nor my wife, nor I needed to see a large city such as Santiago, we took a route through the outskirts of town in the direction of the home of our host. Soon we arrived in hilly terrain of the coastal cordilleras where we saw the first cacti, one of the many forms of Trichocereus chilensis This area has for many years now experienced increased droughts, so that there is barely enough water that runs down from the mountains to irrigate the fertile soils of the valley where Olmué is located. It is said that the best tomatoes in Chile come from this valley.

Olmué is a pretty village-like town with a square. Ritter's home is situated a little farther into the hills, in the village of Granizo which is also the ultimate destination of the bus service,

Ritter took us to the charming cabaña that belonged to his acquaintance, Mrs Kern, where we would be staying. That evening we visited Ritter in his home, a pretty little house situated high in the hills. Around his house is a fenced off garden where some of the cacti that he had collected are growing. Somewhat lower is a well, that provides the water for his small plantation .....
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Pyrrhocactus garavental photo: Buining

As there had only been 9 mm of rain during the previous year, the well had to be dug out much further as the water level reduced daily.

Pyrrhocactus curvispinus var. campanense.   photo: Buining

Ritter's study offered a wonderful view over the Andean coastal cordilleras which here reach altitudes of up to 2,000 m. It is remarkable that Ritter has to water his cacti regularly and give them some protection from the bright sun with the help of palm-leaves. Experience has taught him that even plants from the hot barren deserts in the north of Chile will die here, without additional watering and sun protection. Remarkable, because some 1,000 km farther north they are able to survive without rain or shadow. This illustrates how careful we need to be to copy the conditions under which these plants grow in their home land. It was also remarkable that the white-waxed Copiapoa from the north had lost much of their wax when growing in Ritter's garden. The most significant is doubtless an insect that lays its eggs among the plant and produces a grub that can completely eat away the inside of a cactus, or at least cause severe damage so that the plants eventually die.

photo Buining: descend from Cerro de la Campana
 at  900 m. overlooking Granizo in the valley below.
My wife with Ritter.

These insects seem to exist more or less everywhere in cactus country. In addition, rats, particularly in these dry times, will chew at cacti for food and water. The house and gardens of Mrs Kern, who herself lived in Valparaiso, was a real paradise, partly because it was so simple and partly due to the marvellous sunny weather. The garden was full of aromatic eucalyptus trees and all kind of fruit trees while hummingbirds zoomed around bushes with tubular flowers.

Together with Ritter, and once with his neighbour, Mr. Winterhalder, we walked into the hills where rareties such as Pyrrhocactus garaventai, P. horriduspinus var. robustus and P. curvispinus var. campanense were collected.

My wife and I celebrated Christmas together in Mrs. Kern's cabaña with Friedrich Ritter as our guest. It was a strange and yet very nice Christmas, with candles between branches from the Eucalyptus trees.

Unfortunately, Ritter's Ford-pickup needed some repairs, so our departure was delayed. Fortunately, this provided the excuse to climb the steep hill where Pyrrhocactus engleri grows. Ritter had not been here for some 12 years. During the climb, we saw the omni-present Trichocereus chilensis. At a somewhat greater altitude Pyrrhocactus curvispinus can be found, right up to the peak at  2,000 m. Here, on the ridge of the hills tops we also found Pyrrhocactus engleri with highly variably coloured spination. The seeds indicated that they were very different from those of the other Pyrrhocacti, so that it is clearly wrong to jump to conclusions about little known plants and reduce them to synonyms, as was done, for example by Hutchison.

Pyrrhocactus engleri      photo: Buining