Botanical name: Agave Americana "Glauca."

Botanical name: Agave Americana "Glauca."
Attributes: This Central American native often creates a love-hate relationship with its owners. Its sculptural steel blue leaves, impressive size (up to 10-feet wide) and ability to thrive in the hottest, driest conditions make it easy to love for the effect it creates in a landscape or as a houseplant. But it is difficult to move indoors or out because of its sheer size and its vicious spines at the leaf tips and along the leaf margins. These attributes contribute to the volume of phone calls from distressed Agave owners wanting to donate their plants to charity.
Bloom time: Blooms once every 100 years (hence its name), but may bloom as soon as 25 to 40 years, with a flower spike that branches like a candelabra and reaches heights of 25 feet.
Culture: Purchase a small plant at a local greenhouse or remove a pup from a large established plant. Pot into a clay pot with a well-drained, sandy soil and provide full sun. Fertilize in the early spring and then sparingly throughout the year. Allow soil to dry out completely between waterings. Be sure to bring indoors in fall before a hard freeze and grow in a cool sunny location.
Landscaping tips: Agaves are found in about seven colors and forms including the A. parryi, where mescal is produced to make Tequila. Agave is great as a large specimen plant in a container and when placed as a landscape feature indoors or out.
Cost: $8 to $45 depending on plant size and rarity. Found at local greenhouses dealing in cactus and succulents or from mail-order catalogs.
Source: Powell Gardens