Pronounciation: A-GA-ve schi-di-GER-a

Hardiness zones
Sunset 11-13
USDA 8-10 (arid regions only)

Landscape Use: Specimen, accent, container/patio pot plant, xeric or desert landscapes. Maguey looks excellent when clustered into groups in a landscape setting.

Form & Character: Small, visually interesting to captivating, sharp and rounding, rigid, dangerous, symmetrical, compact.

Growth Habit: Evergreen, succulent herbaceous perennial, monocarpic, grow slowly by producing a basal rosette of leaves to a maximum height of 2 feet with equal or slightly greater spread, generally does not grow basal offshoots.

Foliage/Texture: A mature maguey specimen can have upward of 100 succuluent leaves per rosette, each leaf is dark green with white striped markings and terminate in a sharp inflexible tip, leaf margins are fibrous and also occasionally curve upwards; medium coarse texture.

Flowers & Fruits: Mature maguey produce a flower spike 7- to 12-feet tall with yellow, orange red, to dark purple flowers (looks somewhat similar to Agave geminiflora flowers). Maguey produces a tall flower stalk with a myriad of small yellow for the size of the plant.

Seasonal Color: Determinate flowers during late summer through winter.

Temperature: Mostly tolerant, but some heat stress above 110^oF and will freeze below 15^oF. Otherwise, maguey foliage will redden during winter cold, but will return to dark green during spring when the weather warms.

Light: Light, filtered shade from western sun in Phoenix is best.

Soil: Well-drained soil is required.

Watering: Being an upland agave, maguey does best if given supplemental water during summer months. Otherwise, leave it dry during the winter months.

Pruning: None, although some insecure 'Hort clod' will want show evidence of "doing something" when in fact nothing needs to be done.

Propagation: Propagate by sowing fresh seed. Otherwise, if (and that's a BIG if) basal offshoots are present, then division of rhizomes (offshoots) is preferred. Allow cut surfaces of propagules to callous over before direct planting.

Disease and Pests: None

Additional comments: Maguey is a stunning agave for small 'up close' landscape spaces. By far, the cultivar 'Durango Delight' (named by Starr Nursery in Texas) is the best and most easily recognized small maguey agave. It is most noted by its very small, symmetrical shape and dark green, sword-like leaves, which have distinctive white markings and white marginal fibers. Other significant cultivated varieties of maguey include: 'Black Widow', 'Shira ito no Ohi' (Queen of white thread-leaf agave), and 'Royal Flush'