Century Plant Triplets--11th Week, Oh Solo Me Oh!

So goes Righty. Actually Righty does go, but Lefty stays for now, all by itself. Peewee departed the scene the previous week. On this beautiful blue-sky day, solo Lefty looks magnificent, a great century plant specimen in its prime with bloom clusters resembling cheerleader pom-poms. The pixstrip shows the century plants for May 6 and May 13. (Click for larger older/newer side-by-side image.)

I'm channeling Lefty, anthropomorphizing him in a short, chorus-part parody of O Sole Mio. You might also recognize the same tune for It's Now or Never.

Oh, solo me, oh.
Now by myself.
My buds ain't no mo',
Just Lefty's left.

How much time,
I've got to stay,
I don't know what's what,
I just don't know squat.

My thoughts of the pix for that day:

On Thursday, May 9, I drove by the corner to view the plants. Only one left. Thought about deliberately deviating from my Monday noonish pic shoot and taking pix Friday, but didn't. Crossed my fingers and hoped the property owners didn't have an order in for lopping the last one, as Friday, being a workday, might be a likely cutoff (g) day. Thought maybe I'd take pix Saturday. Nope. By the time Sunday rolled around, I figured I might as well shoot Monday.

Friday morning, I sent email to Portraits of Wildflowers blogger Steven Schwartzman that only one stalk remained. He wrote back shortly and replied that he noticed the previous day that only one century plant was left.

I took my usual diagonal-view pictures. For comparative pictures to newer angle ones that I took the previous week, I took some from across the street (1st pixstrip below) and from the right (2nd pixstrip).

The angle of the previous two weeks' rightside pix was about 45 degrees. For May 13, I stepped back farther so I could better frame Lefty in the background. That pic includes part of the tower, and the company's masonry sign is now right of the wooden pole, narrower than in the other two rightside pix.

Index to my agave posts, from the time I first spotted the set of triplets in early March to mid-June, about 3 1/2 months.
1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16

Century Plant Triplets--10th Week, Minus Peewee

Peewee's gone! The pixstrip shows the century plants for April 29 and May 6. (Click for larger older/newer side-by-side image.) Lefty and Righty are in full blooms.  Lefty and Righty look to be in full robustness. Alas, poor Peewee. I suspect caretakers cut it down rather than risk having Peewee fall over onto a vehicle stopped in traffic, or pose a road hazard with downed stalk and bloom clusters.

Over the last few years, I've spotted some singular century plants in the initial sprouting stage. A plant would sprout a stalk, spread bloom clusters, which later are surrounded by busy bees boisterously buzzing bulky blooms, ... (Say that last phrase fast multiple times, why dontcha?) One day, the plant would be gone, or cut near the base.

Apparently, cutting a century plant down comes with hazards. Dave's Garden has a webpage that includes posts about stalk removals, with or without blooms. Apparently, the sap can be very painful and dangerous to contact.

My thoughts of the pix for that day:

On Friday, May 3, I received email from Portraits of Wildflowers blogger Steven Schwartzman that he took pix of the "the two remaining century plants". That meant one [plant] is missing, most likely, cut down. On Monday, May 6, I took my pictures and confirmed it was the leaning Peewee that's gone. Thus, the one [pic] I have for Monday, April 29 was the last one I have in my possession with all three plants. I feel lucky that I decided to take the pic last Monday (April 29) while Peewee was still there.

The main pic is the one that I've been taking from the square at the gas station. The second one is the view from the bank across the street. (Tossed out several pictures because of bad timing with cars in the way.) The third one is the view from about 45 degrees from the right. The two remaining plants look like leaners. We'll see how much longer they fare [fare well before the farewell, that is].

In my thoughts for that day, I had intended to use the second and third pictures as individual ones. For this article, I decided to make comparative composites of April 29 and May 6 images for both front and right side views.

Index to my agave posts, from the time I first spotted the set of triplets in early March to mid-June, about 3 1/2 months.
1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16