The Gardener Magazine

At play with AGAVES

I call agaves my ‘blueprint of God’. The most spectacular feat of nature is the imprint of the thorns and leaf margins first visible as the soft leaves start to uncurl from the growth point and which stay on the leaves even as they mature into adult form. I can take pictures of these imprints forever and they never stop fascinating me!

There is just no denying that certain agave species and cultivars are so striking that they completely change the immediate landscape with their presence. This is a diverse genus when it comes to shapes, textures and foliage colours, such colours as dull green, steel-grey, iridescent silvery-blue and even variegated with white, cream or yellow are all thrown

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