The agave (Agave americana) that I transplanted to a spot outside the back door as a fist-sized stub about a decade ago has reached three feet across with spiny leaves that could easily impale any hearty mammal. To avoid the most direct damage, I trim off the sharpest part each time I am here. Anyway, the plant is about to do it’s thing. That is, shoot a 12-to-18-foot (4-to-6 meter!) center stalk that culminates in flowers and ultimately dried seed pods. Sometimes called a Century plant this is a mis-nomer as it takes only (in this case) a decade to reach this point. The entire plant then dies off. Not absolutely sure this is about to happen, but looking at the image you might see the yellow patches on the spines. It appears that the plant is drawing its energy inward, away from the spines in order to shoot the stalk up. Either that or the plant is dying. We’ll see. Was considering putting a web-cam on it as it is just outside the back office window…