RESOURCES

Ralph Martins cactus finder database query and Christophe Ludwigs database query are the most comprehensive tools available for finding cacti and other succulents.  You can search by species or location and has been the basis of my recent travels.  Data with km references are the most accurate.

Having found a reference to a location are you sure it’s the right place? eg San Antonio, Bolivia.

Go to Geonames there are 103 San Antonio’s in Bolivia.  This site lists their GPS, state and municipality.

Google Earth map your planned travels and access roads, nearest accommodation, etc.

For a list of literature and synonyms referring to your target species go to IPNI

There are many home pages which have distribution maps for specific genera/species.  Go to the cactus mall home pages tab for links to these.

Cacti guide.com contain locations, photo’s of plants in cultivation and some in habitat as well as synonyms.

BOOKS

Englera 16 ,  Eggli Schick & Leuenberger has over 600 pages of Ritters collection data.  Invaluable for South American cacti.

Copiapoa , Schulz & Kapitany has GPS references, maps and photographs of Copiapoa.

Gymnocalycium,  Charles has maps with location data and photographs for the entire genus.

Uebelmannia in their Environment, Schulz and Machado has GPS data, maps and photographs for this genus.

Journals The CSSA journal and Cactus & Co, to name just 2, have quite detailed locations as do journals in other languages.