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Grand Canyon century plant

Agave phillipsiana

Agave phillipsiana is a rare succulent rosette plant from Arizona, found only in Grand Canyon National Park on river terraces. It is known for a tall flowering stalk, and growing it well means giving it sharp drainage and full sun, as with other agaves.

Family
Asparagaceae (Asparagus family)
Grows as
Shrub, Perennial
Light
Full sun
Water
Water sparingly and let the soil dry out fully between waterings.
Soil
Fast-draining gritty or sandy mix.
Temperature
15–35 °C; protect below 5 °C
How easy
Moderate
Native range
N. Arizona
Climate
desert or dry shrubland

About

Agave phillipsiana is a rare species of flowering plant in the asparagus family known by the common names Grand Canyon century plant and Phillips agave. It is endemic to Arizona in the United States, where it lives only in Grand Canyon National Park. It is a perennial herb or shrub.

This plant forms one or more rosettes of large lance-shaped green to gray-green leaves with teeth along the edges and spines at the tips. The leaf blades grow up to 78 centimeters long by 11 wide. The flowering stalk grows up to 5.5 meters tall. The branching inflorescence has clusters of many flowers each 7 or 8 centimeters wide or more which are greenish and cream-colored with hints of maroon. Long stamens protrude from the flower corollas.

Other Agave plants

Agave abisaii · Agave americana var. franzosini · American century plant · Century plant · Agave anomala · Agave arcedianoensis · Arizona century plant · Maguey · Fox Tail Agave · Cow's Horn Agave · Agave brittoniana · Cayman Agave

Text excerpted from the Wikipedia article Agave phillipsiana by its contributors, under CC BY-SA 4.0; the excerpts and the care summary drawn from them are shared under the same licence.

The care summary was written by AI (Claude, Anthropic) from the sources on this page, with general growing knowledge where they are silent. Check before relying on it.

Life form, climate and native range: World Checklist of Vascular Plants, Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew (CC BY 3.0), reformatted; see Plants of the World Online.

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