Plant Profile: Agave potatorum "Cameron's Blue"

Latin name: Agave potatorum "Cameron Blue" ("ah-GAH-vay pot-ah-TOR-um")
Common name: "Cameron Blue" agave, Butterfly Agave
Originally from: Puebla and Oaxaca
Blooms: A 10-20' tall spike with yellow flowers happens once in the plant's lifetime.
Light: Full sun.
Water: Winter rain is enough.
Height x width: 18" x 18"
Zones: 8-11
Where to find in P. Garden: Three at the top of PG

A small to medium sized solitary agave (no pups, boo hoo) from the semi-arid highlands between 4,000 and 7,000 feet of Puebla and Oaxaca, with wide broad gray leaves that form in a lovely symmetrical rosette to 1 to 2 feet tall by 2 to 3 feet wide. The leaves have chestnut brown spines and a wavy 1" long terminal spine.

This cute little agave was appreciated by the Nahuatl Indians who called it "papalometl" meaning "Butterfly Agave", and it's now also known as maguey Tobalá locally, but the species name "potatorum" comes from the Latin word "potator"' meaning "of the drinkers" because the plant was used to make alcoholic drinks (mezcal brand Los Nahuales uses a. potatorum for example.) 

Like all (or most) agaves, this one wants full sun very little water - surprise! A great choice for water wise gardens. Plant a nice swath of these little spiky things.

Quick trip

Matt and I popped out to the garden today and moved some smaller rocks from PRG to PH in order to make room for the new rocks that we HOPE will be delivered on Friday of this week.

Yeah, getting a permit to block off 9 parking spots for a couple hours is proving very difficult, due to COVID. The SFPA is involved in trying to make it happen, but we might have to do it the following week.

Back to today. We moved 4 rocks to the upper area to start a terrace along the top of the garden. Then we planted 3 Beschorneria parmentieri. Well, that's what they were labeled as. But in fact there's no such species... there is a Furcraea parmentieri... but it doesn't look anything like these plants... which actually look like Agave vilmoriniana to me. Well, whatever they are, there are three of them planted at the garden now so good luck with that.

I trimmed up the front arch vine (again) and picked up the usual discarded clothing and rubbish from the garden, while noticing that 311 still hasn't come for the waste left last week. So I put it in the 311 app again.

The photo? That's Matt next to a Yucca faxoniana at Berkeley Botanic Gardens last week. I would DIE to have one of these! Total CHONK.

Superb day for EVERYONE!

Woke up, got a new president, the day was already SUPERB!

After that amazing start, Matt and I loaded up and headed to PG for the monthly volunteer day! Andrea, Chris, Josh and Hilary joined us and as usual we got a LOT done with help from our friends.

Hilary set up the hose and got to work watering. Despite a light sprinkling of rain in Pacifica last night, nothing fell in SF as far as I could tell and some plants still need help.

Andrea turned ALL the compost and she and Hilary removed and spread several tubs of good compost too. Before that, we had to remove a bunch of lavender clippings someone left in the composter, and bag them for city removal. 

Remember neighbors - if you're adding stuff to the compost bins, make sure sticks and dry stuff (like dead lavender) is not added. It takes 9+ months to compost down in our climate and that's a waste of space for us.

Meanwhile, Matt, Josh and Chris set about cleaning up the severely messy west end of the drainage ditch. Yep, we will get rain soon and that ditch is very function at those times so it need to be cleared of debris. Loads of Opuntia had fallen in, along with rocks, sticks and dirt. In about an hour they had it totally cleared and it looks fantastic.

Chris planted another Opuntia further up by the ditch, and Josh put on up at the top of the garden. Josh also planted a dozen pink ice plants (Delosperma) in our new bed on the lower path and it looks fantastic.

Lastly, the tool chest took a hit: someone broke in. It's been years since that has happened and this time it doesn't look like much was taken... mostly because we don't keep much in there anymore. But it's still annoying. 

Chris fetched his power drill and he and Matt fixed it right up. Oh well. Nothing can spoil this day.

Back to celebrating our new president!

 

Rock shopping

Yesterday Matt and I went rock shopping at Rice Trucking and Soil Farm in Half Moon Bay. We picked out 10 large boulders for PRG and two pallets of smaller rocks for PG.

The plan is to replace smaller boulders at PRG with bigger ones. People tend to shove the little ones out of the way so they can park on the sidewalk which is so rude.

Then we will take the smaller rocks and use them to build up the downslope edges of some beds at PG. Mmm, rocks!

Rocks migration

Matt and I had another great garden day yesterday. We planted a large Agave tequilana “Sunrise” at the top of PG, as well as three variegated Yuccas that we had rooted this year. 

After that, we turned our attention to the lower path at PG. We have recently planted some aloes and agaves down there but the area was still looking pretty scruffy and as it’s fairly steeply sloped in the left bed it needed to be held up somehow.

After that, we turned our attention to the lower path at PG. We have recently planted some aloes and agaves down there but the area was still looking pretty scruffy and as it’s fairly steeply sloped in the left bed it needed to be held up somehow.

The solution was obviously to get some good sized rocks to hold the slope up. Knowing that some of the smaller boulders at PRG don’t really prevent cars from getting too close to the sidewalk we decided to re-purpose half a dozen of them. We went down and selected two and Matt put them on a dolly and drag them up the street. As you can imagine, they are extremely heavy and that was not a vast amount of fun.

Knowing that some of the smaller boulders at PRG don’t really prevent cars from getting too close to the sidewalk we decided to re-purpose half a dozen of them. We went down and selected two and Matt put them on a dolly and drag them up the street. As you can imagine, they are extremely heavy and that was not a vast amount of fun.

So I drove the truck down we loaded two more rocks on the dolly and then hooked the dolly onto the back of my trucks hitch…

Surprisingly, it stayed on as I drove extremely slowly up the hill two blocks and turned around. Genius redneck hack achieved!

We installed the six rocks and I think the result was really worth the huge amount of effort as you can see from the photos!

After that we did a little watering and packed up for the rest of the day.

Big agave transplant

Today Matt and I dug up and moved a nice big Agave weberi “Arizona Star” to PRG from our house. This replaces one of the ones that flowered there this year and subsequently died, as they do. Big job but great result I think. 

We will need to find another large agave to go in the other bio retention cell at PRG where an "Arizona Star" flowered... but I think we will recover from today's effort first ;)

We also moved a large Agave “Sharkskin” from home and three others from the bottom of PRG into a group halfway up the street. Not bad! Previously there were three Agave impressa there, but they failed to impress. One died right away and the other two were looking extra ropey. We brought the survivors home to see if they can be rehabilitated.

Lastly at PG we rescued a pot of Gaillardias someone left there, and some Agave vilmoriniana bulbils I had hoped would grow bigger on the stalk, but someone cut it down instead. Ack! At least I found the stalk and saved the small babies.