Autor: Buxbaum
• ETYMOLOGY
A genus of which the smell of flowers and fruits are reminiscent of fragrant bedstraw (Galium odoratum) or tonka bean (Coumarouna or Dipteryx odorata), or cassia cinnamon (Cinnamomum cassia), which contains coumarin (hence the name of Cumarinia), a substance used industrially to flavour among others, Amsterdamer cheese.
• DESCRIPTION
A genus of rather small plants, clustering from the base, bearing long soft cylindrical tubercles each with a groove, with long, fine and hooked spines each like a fishhook.
Flowers diurnal, small, self-fertile, appearing at the base of the groove on tubercles, yellow pinkish. Fruits cylindrical, at first carmine red, quickly becoming dark, fragile, fragrant. Tiny brownish seeds, egg-shaped, smooth and shiny.
• HABITAT
The monotypic genus Cumarinia grows up to 1600 m in altitude, on limestone soils, in crevices, in the shade under vegetation, among organic debris, in pockets of often relatively humid humus.
• DISTRIBUTION
Mexico (San Luis Potosi, Tamaulipas).
Currently 1 only recognised species:
– Cumarinia odorata* (Boed.) Buxb. 1951
References: "TAXONOMY of the CACTACEAE" - ISBN 978-84-617-3723-9 (Vol. 1)