{"id":40014,"date":"2022-06-14T02:09:46","date_gmt":"2022-06-14T08:09:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/century-plant-shows-off-spectacular-bloom-in-cortez\/"},"modified":"2026-03-31T02:53:18","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T08:53:18","slug":"century-plant-shows-off-spectacular-bloom-in-cortez","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/century-plant-shows-off-spectacular-bloom-in-cortez\/","title":{"rendered":"Century plant shows off spectacular bloom in Cortez"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Bruce
Bruce Dyer stands next to a century plant that unexpectedly bloomed in his front porch garden. (Jim Mimiaga\/The Journal)<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>\n

An inconspicuous desert plant in Bruce Dyer\u2019s front yard in Cortez transformed into a giant while he was on vacation.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy neighbor called and said a tall tree had suddenly grown up. It\u2019s like Jack and Beanstalk,\u201d Dyer said.<\/p>\n

The distinctive species of agave on Chestnut Street is known as a century plant. It takes eight to 30 years to bloom and does so in spectacular fashion, then dies.<\/p>\n

When blooming, the agava americana species sends up an impressive flower stalk that grows up to a foot per day and reaches 10 to 20 feet with arms of full of blossoms.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe did not know, it\u2019s one of those unexpected surprises that occur in life,\u201d Dyer said. \u201cIt\u2019s exciting.\u201d<\/p>\n

He said it was planted in 2006 as part of a cactus garden and is watered from a drip system. The garden is fed soil conditioner occasionally.<\/p>\n

While the mother century plant will die a few months after it blooms, offshoots will survive, said Vic Vanik of Four Seasons Greenhouse in Dolores.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey are slow growing and take a lot time to establish,\u201d he said. \u201cCentury plants are fairly unusual this far north, so it\u2019s really special.\u201d<\/p>\n

Vanik sells century plants, although none are in stock now. He said when they are cultivated and cared for in gardens, they tend grow and bloom a little sooner than in the wild.<\/p>\n

The towering flower stalk has generated quite a bit of interest in the neighborhood, Dyer said.<\/p>\n

It is amazingly sturdy and holds up to the winds, helped by being sheltered in a plaza of townhomes.<\/p>\n

The blossom began to shoot up after Dyer left for vacation May 1, and grew more than 10 feet by the time he returned.<\/p>\n

The plant\u2019s offshoots look to be healthy and might create another great show in 10 to 20 years, Dyer said.<\/p>\n

jmimiaga@the-journal.com<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Slow-growing agave puts up flower once in 8-30 years, then dies<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":40015,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[21,28,29],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-40014","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-cortez","tag-headlines","tag-newsletter"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40014","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=40014"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40014\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":84516,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40014\/revisions\/84516"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/40015"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=40014"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=40014"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=40014"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=40014"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}