Succulents and More™

I’ve been dragging my feet on this, but the time has finally come to address the elephant in the room. The winter of 2025–2026 has been like no other I can remember. We got down to freezing maybe a couple of times, for a few hours near sunrise, but that was it. Some mild frost, but no serious freeze. And we haven’t had excessive amounts of rain either. As a result, we shouldn’t have had much, if any, damage in the garden. And yet look at this: Agave potatorum ‘Cherry Swizzle’ rotting in the center As you can see below, there are plenty more examples of rotting agaves. I had barely brought home this variegated Agave attenuata when it started to fall apart: Variegated Agave attenuata Mangave ‘Bloodspot’ × Agave parrasana : Mangave ‘Bloodspot’ × Agave parrasana This Agave impressa was one of my favorites. This really hurts: Agave impressa And it is a complete loss. There is no coming back from this: Agave impressa This variegated Agave victoriae-reginae is a goner: Variegated Agave vic...

A couple of weeks ago, I bought an Agave attenuata ‘Blue Fantastic’ at the UC Davis Arboretum Teaching Nursery for the newly revamped front door bed: Agave attenuata ‘Blue Fantastic’ at UC Davis Arboretum Teaching Nursery Before heading home, I made a brief stop at Trader Joe’s, no more than 20 minutes. While I was in the store, the agave was sitting in the car, with the windows slightly cracked. Imagine my frustration and annoyance when, just a few hours later, I discovered that several leaves were starting to show large brown spots: The next day, after I planted it in the ground Here’s a closer look: And a week later: 20 minutes in a closed car on a reasonably warm morning, that’s all it took. Fortunately, the damage is cosmetic, but still, it’ll take my agave until next summer to shed the blistered leaves. If you’ve ever transported agaves in a closed car on a warm day, you might have experienced this yourself. Some species seem to be more prone to this, especially those with thin...

Winter damage is almost unavoidable. No surprise there. Last winter, we had multiple consecutive days of rain with almost no break. Some aloes developed rot from water sitting in the crown and/or in the flowers, but most grew out of it. I expect stuff like that in the winter. What I don’t expect is agaves rotting in the middle of the summer. But that’s exactly what’s been happening this year. Here are a few good, but sad, examples: Agave chazaroi The first victim was the large Agave chazaroi you see above. I noticed rot developing in the center in early July. It progressed so rapidly, there was no stopping it. All I could do was dig it up and toss it in the yard waste bin. Now there’s a large hole where the agave had been. The second example is a large Mangave ‘Mission to Mars’. I originally bought it in September 2017 in a 4" pot and it has been in the same spot in the sidewalk bed since 2020. It always looks great during the cooler months, but in the summer, the outer leaves f...

On my Santa Barbara trip last week , I bought some plants from Nick Deinhart , including this spectacular Mangave ‘Bloodspot’ × Agave ‘Blue Glow’ cross for my friend Kyle: Mangave ‘Bloodspot’ × Agave ‘Blue Glow’ when I picked it up from Nick Deinhart I loaded my new plants into the car on Friday afternoon when it was about 60°F and sunny. I spent the night in Pismo Beach , less than a mile from the ocean. Overnight, it cooled off to the mid-50s, and it was overcast and somewhat damp when I left on Saturday morning on my drive home. The weather remained cool and overcast for the next hour before the fog lifted and the sun came out. For the remainder of the trip, it was bright and sunny, the temperature climbing into the low 80s by mid-afternoon. I arrived home at around 3 p.m. I had the air conditioning in the car set to 68°F the entire time, except for two quick bathroom breaks when the engine was off, and the air in the car heated up into the 80s. I unloaded the plants right after I g...

One of the plants I bought at last week’s Succulent Extravaganza was a stunning Agave guadalajarana . It was the blue form, seen on the left in this photo taken at Succulent Gardens : I looked through quite a few plants at the nursery before I picked what I thought was the most perfect one. I stowed it very carefully in the car so its leaves wouldn’t get bent or bruised. I unloaded it carefully when I got home so as not to damage it. And then I put in on the front porch in a spot where I thought it would be fine. Except I forgot that this “protected” spot gets hit by the afternoon sun. Not for long, but long enough to do this: