The guys at Xericworld might be able to help you.

Thanks, Mara. I will try there when I get a chance.

I have a hard time with this corner of the agave world. Lots of overlap. The the leaf shape looks like havardiana. The shared range in nature gets these all so mixed up. My view is that the A. Havardiana has a more open leaf and fewer leaves. The A parryii var parryiii has a similar leaf shape but more leaves . This make it hard to tell apart when they are young and before the plants have grown their many leaves or if a plant is grown in a shaded situation . Good luck..

I'm glad I'm not the only one! I have no difficulties identifying some species, but I'm hopeless with most havardiana and parryi. I've found that looking at pics online makes it even more confusing because there is so much variability.

Linda,

Greg Starr has a new book out on Agaves which is reputed to be All That. I'm going to get it from him via Starr Nursery (that gets it autographed for you) so I can start (perhaps) IDing a parryii from a pumila. The book's got an added bonus of being inexpensive.

Thanks for the tip on the book Jeff. I have the Mary and Gary Irish book, which is really helpful at times. I feel like I've already exceeded by plant (and plant books) budget for a bit, but I'm going to add the Starr book to my book wish list. If you happen to figure out what mine are, please let me know!

Linda,

Send me your email via my email plug-in - you can then send me the pics to post at XW if you yourself don't want to join (you should - we have too few ladies, like Mara, there).

Jeff, that's a very kind offer. I will send you an email.