Just like its name "Wild Rabbit's Foot," this fuzzy cactus reaches the ultimate level of fluffiness—it's not just the feet, its entire body is covered in ultra-soft fur reminiscent of a rabbit itself. The only thing that gives away its plant nature are the shiny, rounded leaves that poke out cutely from the top. Whether it's the fluffy body or the leaves, everything about it is irresistibly adorable. It's honestly a mystery why this type of cactus has almost never been seen in circulation in Japan, besides a single sighting on Yahoo Auctions! Well, that mystery starts to make sense once you hear about its natural habitat. It grows in the high Andes of Peru and western Bolivia, at elevations between 3,500 and 4,700 meters—higher than Mt. Fuji! It thrives in peaty grasslands that drop to 0°C to -15°C at night during the dry season—in other words, it is truly an "alpine plant." According to those who've tried, "It can't handle heat and suffers in summer greenhouses," making it almost impossible to keep alive in Japan's hot and humid summers. As for similar species, it's said to be closest to A. floccosa , but both are difficult-to-find rare species. In fact, it was even considered to be placed in its own monotypic genus, Punotia, making it a true rarity on a global scale. By the way, when I mentioned "leaves" earlier, they really are leaves, and they might be close to those found in the fellow Andean species M. poeppigii . Growth is expected to be extremely slow, but in the wild these plants can form colonies over a meter wide.

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  4,900JPY