28 photographs › At a glance
- Jan, shaded
- Feb, shaded
- Mar, shaded
- Apr, shaded
- May, shaded
- Jun
- Jul
- Aug
- Sep
- Oct, shaded
- Nov, shaded
- Dec
Summary
Selenicereus monacanthus, synonym Hylocereus monacanthus, is a species of plant in the family Cactaceae. It is native to parts of Central America and South America (Colombia, Costa Rica, Ecuador, Nicaragua, Panama, Peru, Trinidad and Tobago and Venezuela).
Quoted from Wikipedia, "Selenicereus monacanthus", CC BY-SA 4.0.
About the genus · Selenicereus
Selenicereus, from Ancient Greek σελήνη (selḗnē), meaning "moon", and Latin cēreus, meaning "candle", sometimes known as moonlight cactus, is a genus of epiphytic, lithophytic, and terrestrial cacti, found in Mexico, Central America, the Caribbean and northern South America. The term night-blooming cereus is also sometimes used, but this is also used for many night-blooming cacti, including Epiphyllum and Peniocereus. In 2017, the genus Hylocereus was brought into synonymy with Selenicereus. More on Wikipedia ›
Quoted from Wikipedia, "Selenicereus", CC BY-SA 4.0.
Cultivation
Seasons
The rain rule reads a sharp season: 70% of the median year's rain (803 mm of 1,084 mm) falls in January to May and October to November. The temperature curve is flat, 2.4 °C between the warmest and coldest month, so the growing-season rule does not infer a growing season from it. Months are the habitat's, southern hemisphere. The habitat lies within 10° of the equator, where the shift rule does not apply, so they are not shifted for a collection elsewhere.
Rain
1,084 mm in the median year at the habitat, 803 mm of it January to May and October to November. Wettest month March at 152 mm, driest month July at 45 mm. Across the grid cells of the range the year's total runs 636 mm to 2,662 mm, the 10th to 90th percentile of each cell's own year. The median of the cells' own yearly totals, 1,372 mm, is the year's rain at the top of the page; the 1,084 mm here is the median year's, the twelve monthly medians added, which the rain rule reads. Habitat calendar, southern hemisphere; median year across the grid cells of the range, CHELSA.
Light
Open sky over the habitat: 28 to 32 mol/m²/day across the year (daily light integral, median year across the grid cells of the range, CHELSA; the lowest 10th-percentile month across the cells is 22, the highest 90th-percentile month 40).
Warmth and air
Coldest: the 1st-percentile night over 44 years at a typical spot in the range is 20.7 °C, the absolute minimum 18.8 °C, no frost in 44 years (NASA POWER daily minima). Warmest: the 99th-percentile day is 36.7 °C. Monthly means: the coldest month's mean nightly low 20.1 °C in August and September (across the grid cells of the range 15.7 °C to 24.9 °C), the warmest month's mean daily high 27.4 °C in March and April (median year across the grid cells of the range, CHELSA). Cold floor: 20.7 °C, which is the 1st-percentile night over 44 years at a typical spot in the range (NASA POWER).
Relative humidity at the habitat: 66 to 68% across the year (monthly means, median year across the grid cells of the range, CHELSA). A figure about the air, saying nothing about how the plant takes water.
How this section is made
Each card states this species' habitat figures with their sources, and what two fixed rules read from them; nothing here says what the plant does, wants or tolerates. The rules · the terms.
Seasons. Read from the median year of CHELSA monthly rainfall and mean temperature across the grid cells of the range: 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 moves 4 °C or more and the habitat lies 10° or more from the equator. A reading of the curves, not an observation of the plant.
Rain. CHELSA monthly precipitation, median year across the grid cells of the range. The rain that falls where the species is recorded; nothing about how the plant takes water.
Light. 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.
Temperature. NASA POWER daily minima and maxima over 44 years at a typical spot in the range, lapse-corrected -541 m to its elevation; CHELSA monthly means, median year across the grid cells of the range. The cold floor is the 1st-percentile night named in its sentence. Not a measured survival limit for any plant in a pot.
Humidity. CHELSA relative humidity, median year across the grid cells of the range.
Climate across the habitat
Habitat months, southern hemisphere
Mean daily high from 26 °C in Jul to 27 °C in Jan, Feb, Mar, Apr, May, Jun, Aug, Sep, Oct, Nov and Dec; mean nightly low from 20 °C in Aug, Sep and Oct to 23 °C in Mar and Apr. The cold quarter, Aug to Oct, is the three months around the coldest month's mean nightly low, centred on the 3 months in a row that tie for it. 1,084 mm of rain in the median year (the twelve monthly medians added), the wettest month Mar. The bands show the 10th to 90th percentile across 97 habitat cells. Over 44 years at a typical spot in the range (NASA POWER) the absolute minimum was 18.8 °C and the 99th-percentile day 36.7 °C; neither is dated to a month. Beneath: daily light integral and relative humidity through the year, each on its own scale.
Figures by month
| Figure | Jan | Feb | Mar | Apr | May | Jun | Jul | Aug | Sep | Oct | Nov | Dec |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Day °C | 27 / 23–31 | 27 / 24–31 | 27 / 24–31 | 27 / 23–31 | 27 / 23–29 | 27 / 23–29 | 26 / 23–29 | 27 / 23–29 | 27 / 23–29 | 27 / 23–29 | 27 / 23–29 | 27 / 23–29 |
| Night °C | 22 / 16–24 | 22 / 17–25 | 23 / 17–25 | 23 / 17–25 | 22 / 17–25 | 21 / 16–25 | 21 / 16–25 | 20 / 16–25 | 20 / 16–25 | 20 / 16–24 | 21 / 16–24 | 22 / 16–24 |
| Rain mm | 98 / 16–196 | 137 / 13–310 | 152 / 19–345 | 137 / 71–281 | 108 / 42–319 | 55 / 21–310 | 45 / 9–269 | 51 / 4–286 | 58 / 6–311 | 84 / 5–364 | 87 / 12–282 | 72 / 30–170 |
| DLI | 31 / 24–35 | 31 / 25–37 | 32 / 26–40 | 31 / 25–37 | 30 / 23–34 | 28 / 22–35 | 30 / 23–36 | 31 / 26–38 | 32 / 26–38 | 31 / 25–38 | 30 / 25–38 | 30 / 25–35 |
| RH % | 66 / 61–72 | 67 / 60–72 | 67 / 60–71 | 67 / 63–71 | 68 / 64–71 | 68 / 63–72 | 67 / 62–71 | 66 / 61–71 | 67 / 62–71 | 67 / 63–72 | 67 / 63–71 | 66 / 63–71 |
How this section is made
Natural habitat
How this section is made
Photographs
Photographs: (c) Raúl A. Ruiz M., some rights reserved (CC BY) (6).
Related
Similar habitat climate The 6 nearest by mean daily high, mean nightly low and rain, month by month. How.
Passiflora vesicaria Orangefruit Passionflower Photo: CC BY, Yung-Lun Lin
Gossypium barbadense Creole cotton Photo: CC BY, Barry Stewart
Byrsonima sericea Malpighiaceae Photo: CC BY-SA, Carlos Henrique
Turnera subulata Cuban Buttercup Photo: CC BY, Ashley Nahomy Beitia
Grias peruviana Lecythidaceae Photo: CC0, Nico
Laportea aestuans West Indian woodnettle Photo: CC BY, Alexis López HernándezOther Selenicereus 21 in the reference
Selenicereus anthonyanus Fishbone cactus Photo: CC0, author not stated
Selenicereus costaricensis Cactaceae Photo: CC BY, Christian Back
Selenicereus glaber Cactaceae Photo: CC BY-SA, Thelmadatter
Selenicereus grandiflorus Queen of the night Photo: CC BY, José Javier Barrios Flores
Selenicereus guatemalensis Cactaceae Photo: CC0, author not stated
Selenicereus hamatus Cactaceae Photo: CC BY, P Gonzalez Zamora
Selenicereus inermis Cactaceae Photo: CC BY, Carlos Domínguez-Rodríguez
Selenicereus megalanthus Cactaceae Photo: CC BY, Luis G Restrepo Selenicereus minutiflorus Cactaceae 
Selenicereus nelsonii Cactaceae Photo: CC BY, Neptalí Ramírez Marcial
Selenicereus ocamponis Cactaceae Photo: CC0, author not stated
Selenicereus pteranthus Princess of the night Photo: CC0, author not stated all 22 ›Names & registers
Also known as Cereus lamairei; Cereus lemairei; Cereus monacanthus; Cereus polyrhizus; Cereus scandens and 15 more. (GBIF Backbone)
The record
Every figure here is derived from public data by a stated rule and names its source; nothing about this species is written for its page by a person or by AI, apart from the marked, credited quotations. How →
Where this page came from built 2026-10-22
gbif.species answeredasked 2026-10-22gbif.synonyms answeredasked 2026-10-22gbif.vernacular answeredasked 2026-10-22names fetched 2026-10-22wcvp.distribution answeredas of 2026-06-04gbif.occurrences answeredas of 2026-10-21GBIF occurrence download https://doi.org/10.15468/dl.hbdw64, of 2026-10-21; 5 records within 1 km of a botanic garden, herbarium or zoo left out (3 at a botanic garden or arboretum, 2 at a zoo; Wikidata's list)climate answeredasked 2026-10-22climate.extremes answeredasked 2026-10-22NASA POWER (MERRA-2) daily 1981–2024, cell -3.50_-80.000, lapse-corrected -541 m at 6.5 °C/kmwikidata answeredasked 2026-10-22wikipedia answeredasked 2026-10-22inat.photos.wild answeredasked 2026-10-22from iNaturalist's open data of 2026-09-27: research-grade observations with an open-licence photograph, the 24 whose photographs iNaturalist received last (the open data holds no votes); filled 2026-10-22inat.photos.cultivated not askedgbif.media answeredasked 2026-10-22none of the photographs on this page is credited to GBIF: those shown are other sources', and GBIF's were the same photographs or were set aside by the photograph rulesopenalex not askednot yet asked for this reference; a later fill takes the papers from OpenAlex's snapshotEvery source is recorded as having answered, reported nothing, refused, failed, not been asked, or answered twice where one answer is taken (“not taken: two items answered”), and, for a source asked when this page was built, when: the figures are as the source held them that day; a source read from a file (Kew's World Checklist, a GBIF download) says "as of" the file's day instead; a row carried from an earlier build of the page names that build instead. Only “nothing to report” is ever shown as an absence. Records came from 40 datasets via GBIF.org; each carries its own licence.