Variegated Smooth Agave - Agave desmettiana variegata

Also known as Variegated Smooth Agave, Dwarf Century Plant or smooth agave, it is a rosette-forming perennial succulent native to southeastern Mexico. It has a very attractive bright green with yellow variegation along the margins. Spines are very small or nonexistent along the margins. It is also noted for its infrequent but spectacular flowering spikes which appear at the end of each plant's life cycle. Each leaf can grow up to 20-40" long and to 3 1/2" wide is thick, rigid, fleshy and linear-lanceolate with smooth margins and a single reddish sharp terminal spine (to 1/2" long). Each rosette will flower only once between 8-10 years. The plant dies after flowering, but new rosettes formed from the base of the mother plant. The flowering stalk rises up to 8' tall containing terminal clusters of pale yellow flowers typically bloom in spring to early summer (May-June).   Some of the information in this description has been found at desert-tropicals.com, llifle.com and cactus-art.biz