Agave pseudosalmiana

[Text last updated: 18 September 2024]

To understand Agave pseudosalmiana we must first understand Agave salmiana. Not an easy task.

Howard Scott Gentry was the Agave Botanist. He was a young man when he entered the habitat of the agave in order to understand the mysteries of their taxonomy. After decades of field research in what he later affectionately called Agaveland, Howard Scott Gentry emerged an old man, and wrote, "Now, like an agave, I am an old being who must make a show of things after years of rain and light catching." And so he did. He wrote a voluminous, illuminating, sometimes entertaining tome, Agaves of Continental North America, 1982.

In the Preface to his great work, Gentry wrote, "Many boundaries between groups are not sharp, as also obtains among many species, because variation in Agave is mostly of a gradual or clinal type; one form or character changes to another by degrees."

Of the Salmianae Group of Agaves, Howard Scott Gentry wrote, "the Salmianae show a high degree of Agave specialization and phylogenetically can be regarded as among the most advanced or modern. Their great variability, obviously abetted by man, is part of their modern modification, a situation of unpredictable eventuation." The species of the Salmianae Group have been cultivated, selected, and probably hybridized by Native Americans "for hundreds if not thousands of years." Gentry lamented, perhaps with some admiration, that "The number of varieties or forms outstrip the perimeters of this work." It is from amongst these varieties and forms that the notion of Agave pseudosalmiana arose.

Agave salmiana occurs primarily in the pulque region of Mexico, namely the States of Jalisco, Michoacan, Guanajuato, Queretaro, and Hildago. The climate is warm, with winters that rarely see cold below -4 C, 25 F. From this central pulque region, selections of Agave salmiana were carried north to Saltillo, of similar climate. Yet in the colder highlands of Saltillo there happened to occur what is now called Agave gentryi, a close relative of Agave salmiana. Also in the region was Agave americana protamericana. And the most ubiquitous large agave is also present, Agave asperrima. With Agave salmiana now present amongst these agaves, the species became familiar in the usual way of agaves. In consequence, the unpredictable eventuation of which Howard Scott Gentry spoke, blossomed. Agave "pseudosalmiana" has traits of all these species, expressed to various degrees amongst the individuals. It is important to note that Agave salmiana traits are dominant in all crosses, thus hybrids with Agave salmiana tend to resemble it so much that one may not realize they are hybrids. It is only from hand-made hybrids produced at Juniper Level Botanic Garden, and to a lesser extent in my garden, that these details were made evident.

Two plantsmen from Texas took the opportunity of their proximity to Mexico to make forays into Mexico in search of interesting things to grow in their gardens. Lynn Lowry and Logan Calhoun independently made collections of attractive forms of what they understood to be Agave salmiana. However, the winters in Texas are colder than those of Mexico, and only cold hardy selections survived. These were admired by Lynn Lowry and Logan Calhoun, and were shared with friends, and by an by made their way to Juniper Level Botanic Garden, a product of Tony Avent's ambitions that sprouted from his world famous Plant Delights Nursery, in Raleigh, North Carolina. Tony Avent collected and sold, and collects and sells, plants from all around the world, with a particular penchant for agaves. T'was thus that I came to know the agaves, and undertook their study and cultivation, with considerable guidance and support from Tony Avent, and one of his employees, Zac Hill.

Inspiration and credit is also due to Wade Roitsch and Carl Schoenfeld. At their now regrettably defunct Yucca Do Nursery, they sold Agave 'Tres Equis'. Wade and Carl reported that, ". . . while traveling in northeastern Mexico, we came across a population of Agave near the Tamaulipas, Nuevo León border [southeast of Saltillo] that appeared to be the result of a hybrid swarm . . . To us it appeared that the genes of at least three species were at play here, with populations of Agave americana protamericana, Agave asperrima, and Agave gentryi all converging. Each plant could resemble one of the species but when viewed as whole it was obvious they were of hybrid origin . . . The best of this hybrid conglomeration . . . we labelled 'Tres Equis'.

In order to assuredly identify an agave, you need to know where it originated, and to see and study it in flower. The first item can not always be had from plants in trade. The second item is more crucial, and rarely occurs, for agaves are neither annuals nor biennials nor perennials. Each plant flowers only once in its lifetime, and that may take anything from 8 to 50 years. [They are thus called multiannuals.] By and by, however, selections known as Agave salmiana 'JCRA', Agave salmiana 'Green Goblet, Agave salmiana 'Logan Calhoun', Agave salmiana 'Bellville', and Agave salmiana 'Saltillo' independently came into flower, and yielded themselves to our scrutiny. Eventually, via the results of hand-made hybrids involving these plants, it became apparent that these were not in fact Agave salmiana. Tony Avent, Zac Hill, and I pondered the results and discussed their meaning. So in the 5th edition of my self-published book, Splendor in Spines, 2018, I proposed the name Agave pseudosalmiana to encompass Agaves 'Bellville, 'Green Goblet', 'JCRA', 'Logan Calhoun', and 'Saltillo', with due credit given to Tony Avent and Zac Hill for leading the inquiry to try to understand this relationship.

Agave pseudosalmiana have these coherent traits:

  • resemblance to Agave salmiana in leaf shape and over-all form (especially when young)
  • leaves greener and glossier than Agave salmiana
  • yellow flower tepals that are cuculate and papillose
  • greater hardiness to cold, -12 C, 10F instead of -4 C, 25 F
  • genetic dominance of leaf traits when hybridized, even against the very dominant Agave victoriae-reginae ; that is to say that the hybrid offspring always look noticeably of Agave salmiana in leaf color and/or leaf shape

Agave salmiana

Agave pseudosalmiana

Known, hand-made hybrids with Agave pseudosalmiana as a parent:

Agave salmiana x asperrima https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/197319785

By and by I will try to add casual observations of, and provide links to, each of the agaves named above.

הועלה ב-ינואר 12, 2024 09:52 אחה"צ על ידי mjpapay mjpapay
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