Yucca
Yucca gloriosa
Full sun and sharp drainage are not negotiable — far more are lost to the watering can than to the winter.
- Type
- Shrub · Perennial
- Botanical family
- Mixed / other
- Foliage color
- Green · Blue-green
- Flower color
- White
- Sunlight
- Full sun is not optional.
- Watering
- Drought-tolerant once established; water sparingly, since too much brings root rot.
- Feeding
- No feeding in the ground; a light spring feed for containerized plants only.
- Frost tolerant
- Yes
- Flowering
- August
- Pruning
- Cut the spent flower spike off at the base, and strip the dead lower leaves away in spring.
- Overwintering
- Hardy through winter where drainage is good; move containerized plants under cover if the winter turns wet.
- Apr–Aug Spring Growth
- Aug–Oct Flowering
- Oct–Dec Growing
- Jan–Apr Growing
- Plant spacing
- 2 ft 11 in
- In-row spacing
- 2 ft 11 in
- Between rows
- 3 ft 8 in
- Square-foot density
- Not suited to SFG
- Root system
- A deep taproot
- Working depth
- 3–6 ft
- Can reach
- 10 ft down where the soil allows
- Spread
- 2–3.5 ft across, about 0.75–1.25× the width of the plant
- Shallowest pot
- 24 in of soil
It mines water and minerals from below anything growing around it, which is what makes it drought-proof and what makes it so hard to be rid of: most of these regrow from any length of root left in the ground.
A deep taproot with spreading rhizomes off it, and every piece left behind grows again. That is why a yucca planted in the wrong place is one of the hardest things in the garden to be rid of, and why it should be sited as though it were permanent.
The habit is Yucca’s own; the figures are what that habit usually comes to at this size, not a measurement of this species. Roots follow the soil either way: a compacted pan, a high water table or heavy clay stops them well short of any of it, and deep open ground lets them go further.
- Cats and dogs
- Recorded toxic
Recorded as toxic to cats and dogs by ASPCA.
The ASPCA row names the genus only. Our catalog names Yucca gloriosa, so the match is at genus level.
Beneficial predators that hunt this plant's pests — grow their favourite flowers nearby to recruit them. companion plant
- Hoverfly SyrphidaeHunts Scale insects
Bee-mimicking flies whose legless larvae graze aphid colonies clean while the adults pollinate. A ribbon of shallow, nectar-rich flowers kept in bloom all season recruits wave after wave of them.
- Ladybird (lady beetle) CoccinellidaeHunts Scale insects
The gardener’s favorite ally: adults and their alligator-shaped larvae each eat thousands of aphids, plus scale, mealybugs, and other soft-bodied sap-suckers. Grow flat, open flowers for the adults and never spray a colony that ladybird larvae are already working.
Green-leaved shrubs with white flowers, like this one.
The Cottage Garden Companion — the gardener's herbarium at cottagegardencompanion.com