If you’re able to visit during this years spring open house, it will be hard to miss the look of love in the air. We have a record 20 century plants in spike in the garden…a number far surpassing any flowering record we’ve set previously. Agaves are a genus of mostly monocarpic plants…they live their
We’ve “enjoyed” frozen precipitation for three consecutive weekends this winter, with one producing a decent 3.5″ snow. There’s something magnetic about snow on century plants, that makes you grab your camera and snap away. The white of the snow looks out of place on an agave, although it does wonders for accenting the architectural structure
Since we’ve been growing agaves, one of the most fascinating things we’ve noticed is the incredible attraction of tree frogs and Carolina anoles to their leaf texture. There is hardly a day that goes by that we don’t spot one or the other, nestled on an agave leaf. Here is our most recent image of
One of our favorite winter hardy (Zone 7b) century plants is the non-spiny Agave bracteosa ‘Stingray’. Here is one of our garden specimens this week, which has been thriving in the ground since 2016. Unlike most agaves, which prefer full sun, Agave bracteosa is better in part sun (full sun for only a few hours
Stingray in the Garden Read More »
Since we are limited in the number of hardy century plant species, our only option for more agave diversity in the garden is to create it by crossing existing hardy species together. Here are a few of our recent successes. Agave x amourifolia is a Plant Delights/JLBG creation from a cross we made in 2016
Sex for the Centuries Read More »
As a plant breeder, one of the cool things we get to do is observe the diversity that arises from a single cross. In some cases, the diversity shows up in the first generation (F1), while in other cases, the first set of offspring need to have sex with each other for the diversity in
Agave x striphantha ‘Striptease’ is a JLBG creation from a 2013 cross of Agave striata and Agave lophantha. Both parents are 30 year survivors here in the garden, so we wanted to see what a combination of genes looked like. Also, Agave striata is the only hardy agave species, whose main crown doesn’t die after
Striptease in the Succulents Read More »
The bees are buzzing with excitement over the impending flowering of five clones of Agave ovatifolia here at JLBG. We’ve never had a year with quite this many whale’s tongue agaves spiking at once, so it should be quite a show. Here’s our Agave ovatifolia ‘Frosty Blue’, which was the first to spike, but the
We grow many century plants at JLBG and one of our best is the amazing Agave ovatifolia…seen here. This 14-year-old clone will be flowering this May, so be sure to catch the amazing 20 foot+ flower spike at the Spring Open Nursery and Garden Days. Some our agaves such as this are clones, while others
A whale of a story…mama told me not to tell Read More »
Because we’ve had another mild winter with regard to absolute low temperatures, the foliage on most of our hardy century plants is still looking good. In colder winters, foliar damage is often caused by our wet, cold winters. While we have been consistently cool and extremely wet (it has rained 50% of the days since
