Mammillaria luethyi

Mammillaria luethyi is a miniature ball-shaped cactus endemic to the Mexican state of Coahuila, covered in tiny white spines and bearing large magenta flowers throughout the summer. It grows in the Chihuahuan Desert at about 800 metres, sunk into a very thin layer of sandy clay and gravel on horizontal limestone slabs. The plant was first noticed in 1952, when Oklahoma professor Norman Boke found it in a coffee can at a hotel in Ciudad Acuna, but the specimens sent to the Missouri Botanical Garden died, and for 44 years it was known only from photographs. George S. Hinton and Jonas Luthy rediscovered it in the wild in 1996, and Hinton described it as a species. The exact wild locations are kept secret to prevent poaching. The International Union for Conservation of Nature lists it as vulnerable. Propagation has made it one of the most widely cultivated Mammillaria species.