Autor: Britton & Rose
• ETYMOLOGY
Genus honouring Thomas Hariot (also written Harriot, 1560-1621), English mathematician, astronomer and naturalist (see picture above). Hariota having been invalidated, Britton & Rose created the name from an anagram of Hariot, Hatiora (see portrait above, public domain).
• DESCRIPTION
A genus of epiphytic or more rarely lithophytic plants, strongly branched, at first erect then pendulous, with short segments well determined, cylindrical or bottle-shaped, not tuberculate and acrotonic. Areoles tiny, spines usually absent or setose when present.
Flowers diurnal, self-sterile, appearing at the tip of stems, heteromorphic, with a very short floral tube, bell-shaped, yellow to yellow orange-coloured, or pink, pollinated by insects. Pericarpel rounded, naked. Fruits small, spherical, naked. Seeds small, shiny, brown or black.
• HABITAT
The genus Hatiora grows in ombrophilous rainforests of southern Brazil, as epiphytic, taking advantage of some organic matter deposited in the hollows of trunks and branches, from 300 m up to 1500 m in altitude. This region has a significant atmospheric humidity.
• DISTRIBUTION
Brazil (Bahia, Espirito Santo, Minas Gerais, Parana, Rio de Janeiro, Sao Paulo).
Currently 3 recognised species:
– Hatiora cylindrica* Britton & Rose Britton & Rose 1923
– Hatiora herminiae* (Porto & A.Cast.) Backeb. ex Barthlott 1987
– Hatiora salicornioides* (Haworth) Britton & Rose ex L.H.Bailey 1915
References: "TAXONOMY of the CACTACEAE" - ISBN 978-84-617-3723-9 (Vol. 1)