Thanks, Pamela. Yes, I've had my eye on this one in Tony's catalog. I suspect there is a lot of largely unrealized horticultural potential among these plants. Forty or so years ago I got a plant of Manfreda maculata from Thad Howard's Zephyr Gardens. I couldn't believe that it would have a chance in the garden, so I tried to grow it as a pot plant. It did not take well to this treatment. It was only years later that I learned that it probably would have survived outside near a house wall. Although my serious side likes very much the lumping of Polianthes, Manfreda and Agave, my not-so-serious side finds that name mangave hilarious. When I want to see if someone else has a not-so-serious side, I pronounce Agave ah-GAH-way (which is pretty close to the classical Greek for the word; it means illustrious). Jim McKenney