This cactacea does not exceed 90 cm in height, however it can definitely get noticed! It has columnar stems with well defined longitudinal ribs, along which rounded yellowish and woolly areoles stand out. The real highlight of this cactus are its extremely dense, thin spines arranged in various directions, of a yellow so bright that it gives the species the name "aurisetus",ancient Latin for "with golden bristles". As typical of the genus, however, the other peculiarity is the whitish down that comes out of the areolas to a highly variable extent depending on the age of the cactus and which creates a pleasant color contrast, for an undoubtedly showy overall effect!