Species
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Lophophora williamsii (Lem. ex Salm-Dyck) J.M.Coult.

Hikuri, Indian-dope, Peyote, Peyotl

Climate known 70 photographs Cactus or succulent
Add one to my plants Sow seed

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

Peyote, also known as Lophophora williamsii, is a small, spineless cactus which contains psychoactive alkaloids, particularly mescaline. Peyote is a Spanish word derived from the Nahuatl peyōtl, meaning "caterpillar cocoon", from a root peyōni, "to glisten".

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

About the genus · Lophophora

Lophophora is a genus of spineless, button-like cacti. Its native range covers Texas through Mexico to southwestern Mexico. The species are extremely slow growing, taking around ten years to reach maturity from seed in the wild. More on Wikipedia ›

The opening of Wikipedia, “Lophophora”, CC BY-SA 4.0, quoted as written.

Family
Cactaceae
Described by
(Lem. ex Salm-Dyck) J.M.Coult.
Native to
Texas, Mexico Northeast, Mexico Southwest
Wild records
1543 in range· 476 open

At a glance

Warmest month
30°C
May, mean day; nights 17 °C (CHELSA)
Rain
359mm/yr
6 wet months · peak Jul 61 mm (CHELSA)
Light
27–47DLI
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 cactus or succulent by the genus Lophophora, which is reliably one kind of plant (archetype table). Rain rule: a summer growing season, May to September in the northern hemisphere (May to September at the habitat, northern). Habitat rain 359 mm a year, wettest July at 61 mm, driest March at 8 mm (habitat calendar, northern hemisphere). Open sky over the habitat: 27 to 47 mol/m²/day. Cold floor -0.1 °C (1st-percentile habitat night, NASA POWER).
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 Anhalonium lewinii Henn.; Anhalonium williamsii (Lem. ex Salm-Dyck) C.F.Först.; Anhalonium williamsii (Salm-Dyck) Rümpler; Ariocarpus williamsii (Lem. ex Salm-Dyck) Voss; Echinocactus lewinii (Henn.) K.Schum. and 35 more.

Cultivation

Grouped as a cactus or succulent by the genus Lophophora, which is reliably one kind of plant (archetype table). The table holds no figure for this group, which spans too much for one minimum; the cold floor is the habitat's alone, and no prose comes from the table.

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

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 (252 mm of 359 mm) falls in May to September, warmer than the year (wet-season mean 23.3 °C against a yearly mean of 19.6 °C). Months are the habitat's, northern hemisphere; shifted six months for a southern-hemisphere collection: November to March.

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 359 mm a year, wettest July at 61 mm, driest March at 8 mm (habitat calendar, northern hemisphere).

This species’ habitat figures, with their source.

359 mm a year at the habitat, 252 mm of it May to September. Wettest month July at 61 mm, driest March at 8 mm. Across the envelope cells the year's total runs 300 mm to 506 mm (10th to 90th percentile of each cell's own year) (median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA; habitat calendar, northern 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: 27 to 47 mol/m²/day.

This species’ habitat figures, with their source.

Open sky over the habitat: 27 to 47 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 23, the highest 90th-percentile month 50).

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 -0.1 °C (1st-percentile habitat night, NASA POWER).

This species’ habitat figures, with their source.

Temperature

Coldest: the 1st-percentile night over 44 years at the typical cell is -0.1 °C, the absolute minimum -6.8 °C, about 4 frost nights a year (NASA POWER daily minima). Warmest: the 99th-percentile day is 36.5 °C. Monthly means: coldest night 6.9 °C in January (across the envelope cells 4.9 °C to 9.1 °C), warmest day 30.4 °C in May (median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA). Cold floor: -0.1 °C, which is the 1st-percentile night over 44 years at the typical cell (NASA POWER).

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. Not a measured survival limit for any plant in a pot.

Humidity

Relative humidity at the habitat: 47 to 58% 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 21 °C in Jan to 30 °C in May; mean night from 7 °C in Jan to 18 °C in Jun. The cold quarter, Dec to Feb, is the three months around the coldest night. 359 mm of rain a year, most in Jul. The bands show the 10th to 90th percentile across 80 habitat cells. Over 44 years at the typical cell the absolute minimum was -6.8 °C and the 99th-percentile day 36.5 °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°frost36.5° 99th-percentile day (undated)-6.8° lowest night in 44 yrs (undated)°C · day and nightcold quarter0255075100mm rainDLI 27–47RH 47–58 %JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
day night rain 10th–90th percentile across 80 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 °C21 / 18–2323 / 21–2526 / 24–2829 / 27–3130 / 28–3330 / 27–3329 / 26–3229 / 26–3227 / 24–3026 / 23–2824 / 22–2521 / 19–23
Night °C7 / 5–98 / 6–1111 / 9–1314 / 12–1617 / 14–2018 / 16–2218 / 15–2218 / 15–2217 / 14–2014 / 12–1610 / 8–138 / 6–10
Rain mm18 / 14–2510 / 7–138 / 5–1120 / 13–2937 / 22–5346 / 36–6861 / 47–8248 / 36–6260 / 47–8630 / 24–3910 / 8–1311 / 9–16
DLI28 / 25–3034 / 31–3641 / 38–4446 / 42–4847 / 44–5045 / 43–4844 / 42–4642 / 41–4436 / 34–3833 / 30–3629 / 26–3227 / 23–28
RH %52 / 47–5750 / 45–5647 / 41–5448 / 43–5451 / 45–5754 / 50–5955 / 51–6055 / 52–6058 / 54–6256 / 51–5952 / 48–5752 / 48–57

Each figure is the median across the 80 grid cells holding the 93 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 1307:1563 (24.625, -101.825). Over 44 years there: absolute minimum -6.8 °C, 1st-percentile night -0.1 °C, 99th-percentile day 36.5 °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 80 distinct grid cells holding the 93 in-range records; extremes and elevation at the typical cell 1307:1563 (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 24.50_-101.875, lapse-corrected -206 m at 6.5 °C/km. Elevation: ETOPO 2022, 1677 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.
NativeTexas, Mexico Northeast, Mexico Southwest
Kew's description“succulent subshrub” · “desert or dry shrubland”· quoted from WCVP, RBG Kew (CC BY 4.0); not derived here
Map marker24.871, -101.082 · in the densest population, 860 records (56% of those in range)
Evidence usedThe map marker and the climate envelope rest on all 1543 georeferenced records inside the native range; the map shows only the 476 openly licensed ones, which alone would put the marker 198 km away. 3 records outside the range (gardens, roadsides, misidentifications) ignored. 1450 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 1543 in-range records; it decides nothing.

Photographs

Lophophora williamsiiLophophora williamsiiLophophora williamsiiLophophora williamsiiLophophora williamsiiLophophora williamsiiLophophora williamsiiLophophora williamsii

Photographs: (c) Sandino Guerrero, some rights reserved (CC BY); (c) José Francisco Colorado-Dapa, some rights reserved (CC BY-SA); (c) Juan Cruzado Cortés, some rights reserved (CC BY-SA); (c) Reid Hardin, some rights reserved (CC BY) (5).

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 Lophophora williamsii, most cited first, from OpenAlex (CC0). A mention, not a cultivation source: nothing on this page is drawn from them.

Mescaline: The forgotten psychedelic
Ioanna A. Vamvakopoulou, Kelly A.D. Narine, Ian Campbell, Jason R.B. Dyck (2022) · Neuropharmacology
Dark Classics in Chemical Neuroscience: Mescaline
Bruce K. Cassels, Patricio Sáez‐Briones (2018) · ACS Chemical Neuroscience
THE APPEAL OF PEYOTE (LOPHOPHORA WILLIAMSII) AS A MEDICINE1
Richard Evans Schultes (1938) · American Anthropologist
Bleogens: Cactus-Derived Anti-Candida Cysteine-Rich Peptides with Three Different Precursor Arrangements
Shining Loo, Antony Kam, Tianshu Xiao, James P. Tam (2017) · Frontiers in Plant Science
Psychoactive Substances of Natural Origin: Toxicological Aspects, Therapeutic Properties and Analysis in Biological Samples
Joana Gonçalves, Ângelo Luís, Eugénia Gallardo, Ana Paula Duarte (2021) · Molecules
The Analysis of Controlled Substances
M D Cole (2003) · Analytical techniques in the sciences
In vitro immunopotentiating properties and tumour cell toxicity induced by Lophophora williamsii (peyote) cactus methanolic extract
Moisés Ármides Franco-Molina, Ricardo Gomez‐Flores, P. Tamez‐Guerra, R. Tamez‐Guerra (2003) · Phytotherapy Research
Identity of peyocactin, an antibiotic from peyote (Lophophora williamsii), and hordenine
G. S. R. Subba Rao (1970) · Journal of Pharmacy and Pharmacology
De novo sequencing and analysis of Lophophora williamsii transcriptome, and searching for putative genes involved in mescaline biosynthesis
Enrique Ibarra‐Laclette, Flor Zamudio-Hernández, Claudia Pérez-Torres, Victor A. Albert (2015) · BMC Genomics

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 Lophophora 2 in the reference

History & registers

Where this page came from built 2026-09-20 · dossier v2 · node
gbif.species answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-19 (offline re-derivation; the backbone was not asked)
gbif.synonyms answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-19 (offline re-derivation; the backbone was not asked)
gbif.vernacular answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-19 (offline re-derivation; the backbone was not asked)
wcvp.distribution answered
gbif.occurrences answeredGBIF occurrence download https://doi.org/10.15468/dl.3h4zam
climate answered
wikidata answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive); that build: carried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive)
wikipedia answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-19; this build: skipped
inat.taxon not asked
inat.photos.wild answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-19; this build: skipped
inat.photos.cultivated nothing to reportcarried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive); that build: carried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive)
commons nothing to reportcarried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive); that build: carried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive)
gbif.media answered
openalex answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-19; 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 23 datasets via GBIF.org; each carries its own licence.