Shaw's Agave - Agave shawii
It was as gorgeous morning when we cruised through the Santa Barbara Botanic Garden. As you know we popped over to the Dudleya section first, but check out the color on this Shaw’s Agave (Agave shawii). BTW, Rancho Reubidoux has some excellent pics on the A. shawii flower spike.
Santa Barbara Botanical Garden (overview)
The garden is divided up in many regions and here’s an overview of their spiky succulent Desert Section. Lots of old growth plants live amongst these sandstone boulders.
Coastal Prickly-pear - Opuntia littoralis
Native to Southern California, this Coastal Prickly-pear (Opuntia littoralis) grows to about 3 feet tall, but can keep expanding far wider in dense clumps.
Agave parryi ?
No ID tag found on this guy, but think it may be the Mescal Agave aka Parry’s Agave (Agave parryi).
Giant Coreopsis - Coreopsis gigantea
This succulent has made our short list of our must have plants. Another native to CA, Giant Coreopsis (Coreopsis gigantea) gets yellow daisy-like flowers and a thick fleshy trunk.
Agave species
Here’s something we haven’t thought of before. This Agave was planted on its side. Sorta like you just took the plant and chucked it in the garden. Well, it seems to be thriving. I wonder how it would look when it gets super big.
Santa Barbara Botanical Gardens
As we kept exploring the 5 miles of paths, we left the succulents and now headed over to check out some of those sweet perennials.
— Far Out Flora