Agave Varieties: Exploring the Diversity of Mezcal

Mezcal is made from agave, the maguey that shapes so much of Mexico's countryside. But "agave" works the way "grape" does: one word for very different plants. A 2022 review in Frontiers in Sustainable Food Systems notes that production across the denomination-of-origin regions draws on more than fifty agave species.

Each species brings its own size, growth rate and relationship to the land it grows on.

Cultivated and wild

Some species are farmed; others are gathered from the hills. The same review records Agave angustifolia as cultivated mainly in Oaxaca, the largest producing state, while A. marmorata and A. karwinskii are listed as wild. A. potatorum appears in both conditions, mostly in Puebla and Oaxaca.

Reading the name

Common names shift from region to region; the botanical name is the stable reference.

Condition: Arellano-Plaza et al., 2022, table 4. The common-name → species mapping will be checked against specialist botanical literature before publication.

A plant's time

An agave needs at least eight years before it is suitable for mezcal. That explains today's tension: output grew from roughly 980,000 litres in 2011 to 7.85 million in 2020, and demand moves faster than a plant can grow.

The authors warn that rising output has put heavy pressure on wild A. potatorum, that propagating a handful of clones narrows genetic diversity, and that cutting the flower stalk interrupts sexual reproduction in plants that sometimes rely on pollinators.

At We Love Mezcal, every agave profile will carry its botanical name, its growing condition and the source behind it.