Species
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Hatiora gaertneri (Regel) Barthlott

Easter Cactus

Climate known 4 photographs Other epiphyte
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Every figure on this page is derived from public data by a stated rule and says its source; nothing here is written by a person or a model, except the Wikipedia passage, which is quoted and marked as such. How it is made.

Summary

Rhipsalidopsis gaertneri, synonyms Schlumbergera gaertneri and Hatiora gaertneri, is a species of epiphytic cactus which belongs to the tribe Rhipsalideae within the subfamily Cactoideae of the Cactaceae. Together with the hybrid with R. rosea, Rhipsalidopsis × graeseri, it is known, in English speaking countries in the Northern Hemisphere, as Easter cactus or Whitsun cactus and is a widely cultivated ornamental plant. It has received the Royal Horticultural Society's Award of Garden Merit.

Text from Wikipedia, “Rhipsalidopsis gaertneri”, CC BY-SA 4.0, quoted as written. Kept separate from everything derived here.

About the genus · Hatiora

Hatiora is a small genus of epiphytic cacti which belongs to the tribe Rhipsalideae within the subfamily Cactoideae of the Cactaceae. Recent taxonomic studies have led to the three species formerly placed in subgenus Rhipsalidopsis being removed from the genus, including the well known and widely cultivated ornamental plants known as Easter cactus or Whitsun cactus.

Text from Wikipedia, “Hatiora”, CC BY-SA 4.0, quoted as written.

Family
Cactaceae
Described by
(Regel) Barthlott
Native to
Brazil South
Wild records
51 in range· 42 open

At a glance

Warmest month
25°C
Feb, mean day; nights 18 °C (CHELSA)
Rain
2141mm/yr
12 wet months · peak Jan 294 mm (CHELSA)
Light
17–34DLI
mol/m²/day, winter to summer, open sky (CHELSA shortwave)
In short condensed by rule from the cultivation cards · not written by a person
Grouped as a other epiphyte by the genus Hatiora, which is reliably one kind of plant (archetype table). Rain rule: a summer growing season, March to September in the northern hemisphere (September to March at the habitat, southern). Habitat rain 2141 mm a year, wettest January at 294 mm, driest August at 107 mm (habitat calendar, southern hemisphere). Open sky over the habitat: 17 to 34 mol/m²/day. Cold floor 10 °C (archetype minimum for a other epiphyte, above the 2.1 °C habitat night).
Each sentence is one card's own one-line form, written by the same rule as the card (Its year, Rain, Light, Temperature); the note cannot say what a card does not. Months are given for the northern hemisphere (set your site in Settings to change this), and the habitat's own alongside. The cards · the figures.

Also known as Epiphyllopsis gaertneri (Regel) A.Berger; Epiphyllopsis gaertneri (Regel) A.Berger ex Backeb. & F.M.Knuth; Epiphyllopsis gaertneri var. serrata (Lindgr.) Backeb.; Epiphyllopsis gaertneri var. tiburtii Backeb. & Voll; Epiphyllum gaertneri (Regel) K.Schum. and 13 more.

Cultivation

Grouped as a other epiphyte by the genus Hatiora, which is reliably one kind of plant (archetype table). The table supplies one figure for this group, a conventional minimum for the cold floor, and no prose.

Its year Rain rule: a summer growing season, March to September in the northern hemisphere (September to March at the habitat, southern).

This species’ habitat figures, and what two fixed rules read from them.

The rain rule reads a summer growing season: 70% of the year's rain (1500 mm of 2141 mm) falls in September to March, warmer than the year (wet-season mean 19.5 °C against a yearly mean of 17.8 °C). Months are the habitat's, southern hemisphere; shifted six months for a northern-hemisphere collection: March to September.

Read from the median year of CHELSA monthly rainfall and mean temperature across the envelope cells: the rain rule takes the smallest set of months carrying 70% of the rain and calls it winter when its mean is more than half a degree below the year's, summer when more than that above, and neither in between; the temperature rule, used only under 120 mm, names the cooler six months when they are at least a degree cooler than the other six. Months are shifted for the other hemisphere only where the temperature curve gives a season to reverse. A reading of the curves, not an observation of the plant.

Rain Habitat rain 2141 mm a year, wettest January at 294 mm, driest August at 107 mm (habitat calendar, southern hemisphere).

This species’ habitat figures, with their source.

2141 mm a year at the habitat, 1500 mm of it September to March. Wettest month January at 294 mm, driest August at 107 mm. Across the envelope cells the year's total runs 1543 mm to 2774 mm (10th to 90th percentile of each cell's own year) (median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA; habitat calendar, southern hemisphere).

CHELSA monthly precipitation, median year across the envelope cells. The rain that falls where the species is recorded; nothing about how the plant takes water.

Light Open sky over the habitat: 17 to 34 mol/m²/day.

This species’ habitat figures, with their source.

Open sky over the habitat: 17 to 34 mol/m²/day across the year (daily light integral, median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA; the lowest 10th-percentile month across the cells is 16, the highest 90th-percentile month 37).

CHELSA shortwave radiation at each envelope cell, a daily-mean flux taken to a daily total and converted at 2.07 mol of PAR per MJ. The sky over the habitat, measured; what reaches a plant under a rock, a shrub or a shade cloth is not.

Warmth and air Cold floor 10 °C (archetype minimum for a other epiphyte, above the 2.1 °C habitat night).

This species’ habitat figures, with their source.

Temperature

Coldest: the 1st-percentile night over 44 years at the typical cell is 2.1 °C, the absolute minimum -3.0 °C, 40 frost nights in 44 years (NASA POWER daily minima). Warmest: the 99th-percentile day is 30.4 °C. Monthly means: coldest night 10.1 °C in July (across the envelope cells 8.8 °C to 12.3 °C), warmest day 25.4 °C in February (median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA). Cold floor: 10 °C. The habitat figure, the 1st-percentile night over 44 years at the typical cell (NASA POWER), is 2.1 °C; the archetype table's conventional minimum for a other epiphyte (grouped by the genus Hatiora, which is reliably one kind of plant) is 10 °C, which is higher, and the floor rule takes the higher.

NASA POWER daily minima and maxima 1981–2024 at the typical cell, lapse-corrected to its elevation; CHELSA monthly means, median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA. The cold floor is the figure named in its sentence, and the archetype table's group minimum where that is higher. Not a measured survival limit for any plant in a pot.

Humidity

Relative humidity at the habitat: 66 to 71% across the year (monthly means, median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA). A figure about the air, saying nothing about how the plant takes water.

CHELSA relative humidity, median year across the envelope cells.

The figures the cards read from are in Climate below, and where they came from in Natural habitat.

Climate across the habitat

Habitat climate through the yearMean day from 18 °C in Jul to 25 °C in Feb; mean night from 10 °C in Jul to 18 °C in Feb. The cold quarter, Jun to Aug, is the three months around the coldest night. 2141 mm of rain a year, most in Jan. The bands show the 10th to 90th percentile across 38 habitat cells. Over 44 years at the typical cell the absolute minimum was -3.0 °C and the 99th-percentile day 30.4 °C; neither is dated to a month. Beneath: daily light integral and relative humidity through the year, each on its own scale.-10°10°20°30°40°frost30.4° 99th-percentile day (undated)-3.0° lowest night in 44 yrs (undated)°C · day and nightcold quarter0100200300400mm rainDLI 17–34RH 66–71 %JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
day night rain 10th–90th percentile across 38 habitat cells cold quarter: the three months around the coldest night extremes over 44 years at the typical cell, marked at the edge: undated DLI, mol/m²/dayRH %each on its own scale
Figures by month
JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
Day °C25 / 24–2825 / 25–2824 / 24–2722 / 22–2520 / 19–2219 / 17–2118 / 17–2020 / 19–2220 / 19–2222 / 21–2423 / 22–2525 / 24–27
Night °C18 / 17–2118 / 17–2118 / 16–2016 / 14–1812 / 11–1511 / 9–1310 / 9–1211 / 10–1312 / 11–1414 / 13–1615 / 14–1817 / 16–19
Rain mm294 / 201–397249 / 166–344195 / 123–292130 / 96–172141 / 111–174116 / 95–143147 / 113–179107 / 85–134177 / 139–225198 / 156–257174 / 126–232213 / 154–271
DLI33 / 31–3531 / 30–3428 / 27–3023 / 21–2419 / 18–2117 / 16–1918 / 17–2022 / 20–2422 / 21–2526 / 25–3031 / 30–3634 / 32–37
RH %71 / 67–7371 / 68–7371 / 67–7370 / 66–7167 / 65–6966 / 65–6766 / 64–6866 / 63–6869 / 65–7170 / 66–7369 / 65–7269 / 66–71

Each figure is the median across the 38 grid cells holding the 39 in-range records, with the 10th–90th percentile span across those cells after the slash where it differs. Extremes and elevation were read at the typical cell 2325:2617 (-26.275, -49.125). Over 44 years there: absolute minimum -3.0 °C, 1st-percentile night 2.1 °C, 99th-percentile day 30.4 °C. Normals: CHELSA V2.1 1981–2010 climatology, 0.05° cells (each the mean of ~36 1 km pixels). Envelope: median and 10th–90th percentile of each month across the 38 distinct grid cells holding the 39 in-range records; extremes and elevation at the typical cell 2325:2617 (its coldest month's mean night nearest the median across cells); its position is the cell centre. Extremes: NASA POWER (MERRA-2) daily 1981–2024, cell -26.50_-49.375, lapse-corrected +147 m at 6.5 °C/km. Elevation: ETOPO 2022, 722 m (cell mean).

Natural habitat

Native range as published by WCVP; the marker is where the records are densest and decides nothing: the climate was read across every in-range record's cell, not at the marker.
Openly licensed records inside the range, framed on where they fall.
NativeBrazil South· introduced: Honduras
Kew's description“succulent epiphyte” · “wet tropical”· quoted from WCVP, RBG Kew (CC BY 4.0); not derived here
Map marker-26.365, -49.236 · in the densest population, 46 records (90% of those in range)
Evidence usedThe map marker and the climate envelope rest on all 51 georeferenced records inside the native range; the map shows only the 42 openly licensed ones, which alone would put the marker 6 km away. 13 records outside the range (gardens, roadsides, misidentifications) ignored. 12 in-range records are placed to worse than 10 km and stay on the map but off the climate.
The map markerthe map marker: the openly licensed record nearest the middle of the densest 1° population of the 51 in-range records; it decides nothing.

Photographs

Hatiora gaertneriHatiora gaertneriHatiora gaertneri

Photographs: Patrícia Mees, CC BY, iNaturalist via GBIF; Jhonatan Matheus, CC BY, iNaturalist via GBIF (2).

Photographs: iNaturalist did not answer when this page was built; what is shown came from the sources that did.

Papers naming this species

Works whose title or abstract names Hatiora gaertneri, most cited first, from OpenAlex (CC0). A mention, not a cultivation source: nothing on this page is drawn from them.

Ethylene Affects Postproduction Quality of Easter Cactus
Susan S. Han, Thomas H. Boyle (1996) · Journal of the American Society for Horticultural Science
Intergeneric Hybridizaton between Schlumbergera Lem. and Hatiora Britt. & Rose (Cactaceae)
Thomas H. Boyle, Alexander Idnurm (2003) · Journal of the American Society for Horticultural Science
Occurrence Download
GBIF.org User (2026) · Global Biodiversity Information Facility
Occurrence Download
GBIF.org User (2026) · Global Biodiversity Information Facility
Hatiora gaertneri (Regel) Barthlott
Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh (2026) · DiSSCo
Occurrence Download
GBIF.org User (2026) · Global Biodiversity Information Facility
Occurrence Download
GBIF.org User (2026) · Global Biodiversity Information Facility
Occurrence Download
GBIF.org User (2026) · Global Biodiversity Information Facility
Occurrence Download
GBIF.org User (2026) · Global Biodiversity Information Facility
Hatiora gaertneri (Regel) Barthlott
Botanic Garden and Botanical Museum Berlin (2025) · DiSSCo

Similar habitat climate the 6 species whose habitat climate is nearest this one's: mean day and night, month by month, and rain on a log scale, in calendar order, so a habitat with the same seasons six months out is far, not near. Nothing else counts: not range, not family.

Other Hatiora 1 in the reference

History & registers

Where this page came from built 2026-09-20 · dossier v2 · node
gbif.species answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-20 (offline re-derivation; the backbone was not asked)
gbif.synonyms answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-20 (offline re-derivation; the backbone was not asked)
gbif.vernacular answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-20 (offline re-derivation; the backbone was not asked)
wcvp.distribution answered
gbif.occurrences answeredGBIF occurrence search API
climate answered
wikidata answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-20 (rederive); that build: carried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive); that build: carried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive)
wikipedia answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-20; this build: skipped
inat.taxon not askedcarried from build of 2026-09-20 (rederive)
inat.photos.wild nothing to reportcarried from build of 2026-09-20 (rederive); that build: carried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive); that build: filled 2026-09-20
inat.photos.cultivated nothing to reportcarried from build of 2026-09-20 (rederive); that build: carried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive); that build: carried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive)
commons nothing to reportcarried from build of 2026-09-20 (rederive); that build: carried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive); that build: carried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive)
gbif.media answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-20; this build: skipped
openalex answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-20; this build: skipped

Every upstream is recorded as having answered, reported nothing, or refused. Only “nothing to report” is ever shown as an absence. Records came from 20 datasets via GBIF.org; each carries its own licence.