''Didymium wildpretii'' is a species of

slime mold Slime mold or slime mould is an informal name given to several kinds of unrelated eukaryotic organisms with a life cycle that includes a free-living single-celled stage and the formation of spores. Spores are often produced in macroscopic mul ...

which feeds on the decaying remains of various species of cacti. It was first described in 2007 and has been found across

Mexico Mexico (Spanish: México), officially the United Mexican States, is a country in the southern portion of North America. It is bordered to the north by the United States; to the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; to the southeast by Guatema ...

and the Canary Islands, but may be present where other cacti grow. Its sporocarps are short (0.1–0.7 mm tall); their sporotheca is pale yellow with an orange stalk and their spores have a diameter of 7.5 μm. When grown on agar, it completes its life cycle in 28–56 days. It grows on basic media with a pH of 7.8–10.0, with optimum growth occurring at 8.5–9.4. The species was named after Wolfredo Wildpret de la Torre, an expert in the

flora Flora is all the plant life present in a particular region or time, generally the naturally occurring (indigenous (ecology), indigenous) native plant, native plants. Sometimes bacteria and fungi are also referred to as flora, as in the terms '' ...

of the Canary Islands.

Hosts

''Didymium wildpretii'' is known to grow on species of the globose cacti ''

Echinocactus platyacanthus ''Echinocactus platyacanthus'', also known as the giant barrel cactus, golden barrel cactus, giant viznaga, or biznaga de dulce, is a species of cactus (family Cactaceae). It is native to central Mexico in the Chihuahuan Desert. This species is t ...

'', ''

Mammillaria carnea ''Mammillaria carnea'' is a species of cactus in the subfamily Cactoideae The Cactoideae are the largest subfamily of the cactus family, Cactaceae. Around 80% of cactus species belong to this subfamily. , the internal classification of the ...

'' and ''

Ferocactus latispinus ''Ferocactus latispinus'' is a species of barrel cactus native to Mexico. Originally described as ''Cactus latispinus'' in 1824 by English naturalist Adrian Hardy Haworth, it gained its current name in 1922 with the erection of the genus '' Fero ...

''; the opuntioid cacti ''

Opuntia depressa ''Opuntia'', commonly called prickly pear or pear cactus, is a genus of flowering plants in the cactus family Cactaceae. Prickly pears are also known as ''tuna'' (fruit), ''sabra'', ''nopal'' (paddle, plural ''nopales'') from the Nahuatl word f ...

'', '' O. maxima'', '' O. pilifera'' and '' O. tomentosa'') and the columnar cacti (''

Myrtillocactus geometrizans ''Myrtillocactus geometrizans'' (bilberry cactus, whortleberry cactus or blue candle) is a species of cactus in the genus '' Myrtillocactus'', native to central and northern Mexico.Germplasm Resources Information Network''Myrtillocactus geometriz ...

'', '' Pachycereus hollianus'', '' P. weberi'', ''

Stenocereus ''Stenocereus'' ( Gk. ''stenos'', narrow, L. ''cereus'', candle) is a genus of columnar or tree-like cacti from the Baja California Peninsula and other parts of Mexico, Arizona in the United States, Colombia, Costa Rica, Guatemala, Venezuela an ...

'' and ''

Neobuxbaumia ''Cephalocereus'' is a genus of slow-growing, columnar-shaped, blue-green cacti. The genus is native to Mexico. Description These cacti show a columnar and upright growth habit, and may be branched or unbranched reaching heights of 10 to 12 m ...

''.

References

{{Taxonbar, from=Q5274265 Myxogastria Protists described in 2007