Autor: Glass & Fitz Maurice
• ETYMOLOGY
Genus honouring George Sebastian Hinton (1949-), Mexican botanist who discovered the taxon (see portrait above, ccourtesy of George S. Hinton).
• DESCRIPTION
Monospecific genus of solitary plants (except when the apex has been damaged), globose to subglobose, becoming columnar with age, with bluish-green epidermis. Deep and well-defined ribs, not tuberculate. Areoles at first woolly at the apex, becoming glabrous with age. Spines few (0-3), slightly curved, more or less papery, soon deciduous.
Flowers diurnal, self-sterile, apical, funnel-shaped, intense pink to magenta. Fruits hidden in the apical wool, naked, with irregular dehiscence, floral remains persistent. Seeds small, rough, black, shiny.
• HABITAT
The monotypic genus Geohintonia grows in very large colonies, but in a limited area, in the state of Nuevo-Leon in Mexico, together with Aztekium hintonii and other cacti and succulents, at approximately 1200 m in altitude, on steep hills or cliffs of pure gypsum.
• DISTRIBUTION
Mexico (Nuevo-Leon).
Currently only one recognised species:
– Geohintonia mexicana* Glass & Fitz Maurice 1991
References: "TAXONOMY of the CACTACEAE" - ISBN 978-84-617-3723-9 (Vol. 1)