You never know when your heart will grow a big asparagus spear. After resting quietly in your yard for fifteen or twenty years, agave plants decide to do something unexpected. Agave plants are a common sight in Austin, Texas, where they’re positioned in front of your favorite mid-priced Mexican restaurant, stuck in a traffic island between a Bed Bath & Beyond and a Whataburger, and groomed into enormous pineapples in grandmother lawns. I had two of them in my yard and had no idea until one of them poked me in the leg.
The agave, as lovely as it is, has the ability to lull you into a state of apathy. One day, you walk past the agave, which is leaning against your mailbox like a drunk and pointing an asparagus spear the size of a telephone poll at the skies. With this asparagus thing, I’m not implying anything about European colonization of the Americas. It juts out of the heart of a languid agave like an asparagus spear, thick as a tree trunk, that could be served at a farm-to-table restaurant for gods. You say it out loud, “That’s strange.” And the guy in the neighbor’s driveway who lives in a camper van tells you, “Did you know that agaves and asparagus are related?”
The Asparagaceae family contains 200 species of Agave (genus Agave). Mexico, the southwestern United States, and the Caribbean are all home to this species. The most common type of agave is used to make tequila, mezcal, and agave nectar, among other things (a sweetener). The century plant, also known as the maguey agave, is most typically used as a landscape ornament. The leather-like leaves of the agave are distinguished by their spiky prickles. Agaves form a symmetrical rosette, with some remaining tight and spherical and others becoming floppy and awkward. An agave may grow up to 20 feet in circumference, around the size of a bouncy castle, given the correct conditions. Most are pleased to live in pots or to adorn the lawns of their grandmothers. Aside from that, agaves are a jumble of inconsistencies.
Number one: An agave is not a cactus.
Agaves are not cacti they’re a completely different type of plant from a different lineage. They’re sometimes mistaken for cacti because they’re thorny and thrive in the desert. Agaves have plump leaves that thin out and are somewhat spiky, similar to aloe which they are not. Some agave plants yield sap, which can be used to manufacture pulque, a fermented alcoholic beverage that predates tequila by millennia. Mayahuel, the Nahuatl deity of agave, used her 400 breasts to serve pulque. She had a brief relationship with Quetzalcoatl. Mayahuel, on the other hand, was not a cactus.
Number two: Agaves lie about their age.
Despite their reputation as century plants, most agaves only live for 15 to 30 years. At the garden center, opinions differ, but you might be able to extend the life of an agave by trimming its lower leaves and leaving only the leaves near the top, or the center of the rosette. Agaves, when freshly clipped, resemble over-sized store pineapples. It is up to the agave in question to decide whether or not this strategy will succeed. Once an agave has developed flower buds from its agave trunk, it has completed its transformation into a completely new plant, and all you can do now is assist the plant in getting its affairs in order. Whatever you do, you’re dealing with a plant that will outlast a couple of house cats. Take or give.
Number three: Agaves are not asparaguses.
Although the agave is a member of the asparagus family, it is not an asparagus. Agaves near death convert decades’ worth of energy into a massive asparagus death spear the size of a cell phone tower tree. The agave makes its final stand with a tremendous explosion of high-weirdness. The ordinary dinner-table asparagus, like the agave, belongs to the monocots (monocotyledons) plant group. They only have one seed leaf (cotyledon). This is a topic on which many individuals have a lot to say. Dave’s Garden provides my favorite definition:
The first leaf that develops from a seed is known as a cotyledon. Dicots have two, while monocots have only one. It’s a big thing. Some plants only have one leaf at the start of their existence, while others have two. There doesn’t seem to be enough of a difference to justify basing an entire plant classification system on. But, well, we have to start somewhere, right?
Orchids, most species of grass, palms, lilies, and the pineapple are all monocots. Long-distance relationships between Europe, Africa, and Asia are asparagus.
The only time an agave reproduces is just before it dies. Monocarpy is the process of only reproducing once blooming, setting seeds, and dying. An agave reserves all of its energy over the course of its existence, waiting for the appropriate moment to disperse its seeds and reproduce. It hunkers down, storing all of its vitality in its heart, weathering years of drought and periods of torrential rain and when it rains in the desert, it’s as if all of the sky devils decided to empty their above-ground pools at the same time. The agave then produces a gigantic, flowering asparagus spear out of its heart for its own purposes.
The agave holds a pollination sex party when the asparagus tree flowers. Bats, ants, hawkmoths, beetles, and doves that feed on nectar arrive to disperse agave pollen and seeds. The agave’s asparagus spear smashes to the ground when it dies, scattering seed babies to grow more agave plants. Or slam a Subaru Outback into a cul-de-sac in South Austin.
It’s a huge pain to get rid of a dead agave. Agaves feature thick root systems in addition to their thorny leaves. The blue-gray leaves will rot into an awkward mound of white and crumbly plant decomposition if left to rot, as if a swarm of bunniculas had an agave hoedown. Old Doritos bags appear to be attracted to dead agave mounds as well. Look for the discarded remnants in the nearest agave corpse if a teenager can find food in it. There’s a giant dead one wrapped around a cactus that’s about to die that’s also wrapped around a mailbox in my area. This same house is constantly putting out boxes of old karate trophies, as if they’re going to be stolen.
Bats and agaves are said to have co-evolved. Agave nectar is used by long-nosed bats, who are an endangered species. The pollen grains are rolled around by the bats. When they fly away to search more food, they carry additional pollen with them, allowing cross-fertilization to occur. Here’s how Bats Magazine explains it:
Mutualists describe a relationship in which both the plant and the bat gain from it. Scientists believe that this relationship evolved as a result of bats and plants coevolving, and that the dependency is so strong that the plants could not reproduce without the bats, who would starve to death if the plants were not around. This association appears to be quite sensitive to disruption.
Tequila manufacturing is one of these disturbances, as it puts long-nosed bat populations and agaves at jeopardy. Tequila is made from the heart of the agave azul, which must be harvested before it flowers. While the loss of so many century plants in my neighborhood is heartbreaking, it is also lovely since it is preventing a swarm of long-nosed bats from going hungry.
The web of life is twisted and has connections all over the place. According to our current understanding, no other planet has as much life as ours. Sure, there might be phosphorescent fish swimming beneath Europa’s freezing oceans or tardigrade-like organisms clinging to Ceres’ water-vapor eruption. If the agave’s asparagus death spear teaches us anything, it’s that life is fleeting and precious, that all living things have quiet links, and that it’s never too late to be weird.
How long does an agave plant typically live?
The bloom stem of Agave murpheyi is rising. I took the photo above at a client’s home, and she called the flowering stalk a “asparagus stalk” because that’s how it looks.
Most people associate Agave with the Century Plant (Agave americana), which they believe will bloom once it reaches 100 years old.
This is a fabrication.
Agave americana does not live for very long and flowers significantly sooner than other Agave species.
There are over 250 agave species, and the majority of them flower near the end of their lives before dying.
The lifespan of an agave is, in fact, mostly determined by the species.
Most agave, in my experience in managed settings, live 515 years after being planted from a 5-gallon pot.
Do agaves die after they bloom?
The life cycles of American agave plants are fairly fatalistic: live, die, repeat. The plants are supposed to die soon after blossoming, typically leaving behind clones of themselves in the form of seeds. The plant, on the other hand, was victorious in its prime.
How long does it take for agave to die?
The lifespan of an agave blooming branch varies according on the cultivar. Some branches grow quickly, while others take a long time.
The blooming period of the agave can span anywhere from 3 to 4 months in most situations. After this time, the blossoming bloom begins to break off and face downward.
Although the bloom stalk’s lifespan is little in comparison to the agave plant’s whole lifespan, it can grow to enormous heights during this brief period.
Once the branch reaches its maximum height, it will begin to sprout several branches that will house the nectar-and-seed-bearing flower. Your agave plant’s blossoms can last for approximately a month before starting to wither and perish.
Does agave grow back after harvest?
We went ATVs into the agave fields and “helped” harvest some agave during my recent trip with the Tahona Society.
There, Master Distiller Jesus Hernandez of Olmeca Altos tequila educated me on some agave facts I didn’t know, so I thought I’d share them:
- Only the female agave plant produces the quiote, a huge asparagus-shaped sprout that sprouts from a mature agave plant to disperse its seed. To avoid draining energy from the agave heart, this is almost typically clipped soon after sprouting.
- You have a year and a few months after the quiote grows to harvest the plant; it can go through one rainy season after sprouting but not two.
- A cogollo, a dense circle of leaves where the quiote would have been, is only found on male plants that do not develop quiotes. When harvesting or baking the agave, most premium producers make sure to remove the cogollo, which has a negative impact on the flavor of the tequila.
- Agave may be picked all year, however during the wet season, they collect less or none at all. This isn’t because the agave is wet and so has a reduced sugar-to-weight ratio, as Hernandez claims that mature plants aren’t as affected, but because it’s difficult to move vehicles into and out of the muddy fields to collect the heavy agave after harvest.
- Occasionally, you’ll come across an agave field with all of the spiky leaves’ tips cut off. According to Hernandez, some producers feel that this helps the agave’s heart grow stronger, but he disagrees. He claims, however, that it is normal practice to chop off the tips of the leaves when they come through each year to apply pesticides and herbicides, just so they can get through the dense rows of agave without cutting the leaves.
- Agave leaves grow and die each year, with new ones growing above them, similar to how a palm tree grows with rows of dead leaves left lower down. I used to think these were the same leaves that just got bigger every year!
- They use insecticides and herbicides every year until the year before harvest because they don’t want any residue on the crop.
- Rhyzomes, or baby agaves, sprout at the base of agave plants and are known as hijuelos. After the mother agave plant has reached the age of 3-4 years, these are clipped and transplanted.
Guillermo Sauza, the distiller and owner of Fortaleza Tequila, also taught me something.
- In the Lowlands, you can get gigantic agave hearts by fertilizing the fields. People don’t normally do that in the area anymore, according to Sauza, because agave prices are so low right now.
How long do blue agaves live?
Blue agave is a short-lived plant with an average lifespan of 8 to 14 years.
A mature blue agave will not survive if the flower stem is cut off. Flowering time is determined by genetics, which also determines when the plant should die.
Because their roots don’t mind being packed, small blue agave plants work nicely in containers. Succulents should be planted in a free-draining potting soil. Maintain a warm environment for the plant and provide it with as much direct sunshine as possible. When the top half of the medium in the pot is entirely dry, water it. Feed your cacti and succulents once every six to eight weeks with a cactus and succulent fertilizer.
Why is my agave dying?
The fact that agave plants dislike cold weather should come as no surprise. These plants will suffer if the temperatures go too much below freezing.
Freezing temperatures may cause agave plants to die, and the leaves will be the first to go. The leaves may begin to turn black and eventually fall off after being extremely dry.
If the freezing temperatures only stay a few hours, an agave plant will most likely recover. The plant will have major problems if the temperature remains so low for an extended period of time.
To try to protect agave plants, keep them closer to regions that can keep them warm. Having agave plants on your patio and near a warm house, for example, may help them survive cold nights better than if they were out in the open.
How Long Do century plants live?
Despite its name, the century plant only lives for 10 to 30 years on average. Its gray-green leaves are 0.91.5 m (35 ft) long, with a prickly border and a hefty spike at the apex that can puncture deeply, and it has a spread of 1.83.0 m (610 ft). The plant sends up a tall, branching stalk filled with yellow blooms near the end of its life, which can reach a total height of 89 m (2530 ft).
How Long Do century plants blooms last?
The century plant (Agave americana) is a common succulent that grows in a rosette and is native to the Southwest United States and Mexico. Despite its name, a century plant blooms for the first and only time between the tenth and twenty-fifth years of its existence, after which it dies. According to the Missouri Botanical Garden, the century plant can withstand the winter in USDA zones 8 to 10.
What do you do after agave blooms?
Because it has spent all of its energy to creating the blooms and then the seeds, the agave dies after it blooms. Yes, you will want to dig it up and dispose of it once it is completely dead. However, you can learn how to propagate, and so perpetuate, your agave from the offshoots around it from the previous Mr. Smarty Plants. Also, take note of the warnings in that piece against working near the old factory and disposing of the remains.
Is a century plant the same as agave?
Any of numerous Agave species in the asparagus family that is considered a century plant (Asparagaceae). The name is most usually attributed to A. americana, a plant that is grown as an ornamental in many regions and provides the fiber maguey as well as the sweetener “agave nectar.”