Agave angustifolia
Agave angustifolia is a prolific producer of offshoots, or pups, as this mother plant demonstrates. Usually, the pups are similar in appearance to the mother plant with some minor variations, so when this pup came up last fall, I was quite surprised, and just assumed it was defective and would die quickly. However, it continued to grow but at a slower rate than expected. Mutants are not that uncommon, but seeing a mostly white pup is rare. It's sort of a white 'Black Sheep'. A standard Agave angustifolia 'marginata' has a narrow white stripe on each side of the leaves as you can see in the mother plant. The width of the stripe can vary from plant to plant. In the pup shown above, the leaves are mostly white with just a strip of green in the center.
In a few weeks I'll be separating this pup and will transplant into a large pot. It will be interesting to see the pups it will eventually produce.
