Mojave yucca

Eastern Australian temperate forests

Fynbos shrubland

New Zealand North Island temperate forests

Arizona Mountains forests

What it needs

Conditions

Light

Full sun

Water

Low water

Spacing

10 ft

Habit

Evergreen, extremely slow-growing, shrubby to tree-like yucca with one to several short trunks, each topped by a rosette of stiff, sword-shaped leaves, that spreads slowly outward into a clump from sprouts on short rhizomes

Care tips

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Plant it where its spines cannot reach passers-by: each stiff leaf ends in a spine 0.3 to 0.5 inches long (FEIS).

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Start from a nursery-grown plant: FEIS says Arizona lists it as subject to theft and vandalism, and that seedlings are hard to establish.

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Give it full sun and sharp drainage, and once it is settled skip summer watering, as Wikipedia advises; FEIS found that extra water early on speeds its very slow growth.

Lifecycle

Planting

Plant it in full sun in gravelly, fast-draining soil. Wikipedia says it thrives in full sun with excellent drainage and needs no summer water, and Plants For A Future that it prefers a sandy loam in full south-facing sun and cannot grow in shade, though it takes sandy to clay soil and poor ground. In the wild FEIS describes dry, rocky slopes, flats and washes on gravelly, often calcareous soil, and the Flora of North America rocky or gravelly mountain slopes. Keep it well away from paths: each leaf ends in a spine 0.3 to 0.5 inches long (FEIS). The record spaces plants 10 feet apart, the widest spread it gives.

Transplanting

FEIS reports that of 939 plants dug by hand from a future mine site in the eastern Mojave Desert and replanted at a nursery, 66% were in excellent condition, 16% in poor condition and 18% dead one to two years later. Young seedlings did worse: all twenty-five six-month-old seedlings planted at the Deep Canyon Desert Research Center died, though about half survived at the milder UC Riverside Botanic Gardens. FEIS says Arizona lists it as a species subject to theft and vandalism, so buy a plant from a nursery that grew it.

Early growth

Water it while it settles, then keep it dry; Wikipedia says it needs no summer water, and FEIS reports potted plants going over a month without water without wilting. Growth is very slow, 0.4 to 1 inch of trunk a year in the studies FEIS cites, and faster with water: at the Rancho Santa Ana Botanic Garden irrigated plants averaged main stems of 34 inches, against 16 inches without extra water, with longer leaves and more sprouts.

Maturity

The Wildflower Center gives up to about 15 feet, Plants For A Future 15 feet, the Flora of North America and Wikipedia up to 16 feet, and FEIS mature stems commonly 2 to 20 feet, with one unusual plant of about 30 feet; the record uses 2 to 15 feet. No source gives a spread. Leaves are 1 to 4.9 feet long (FEIS), clumps commonly carry 4 to 7 stems and up to 23, and old clones grow outward as the central stems die, so the record allows 4 to 10 feet. The Wildflower Center and Plants For A Future class it as a tree, FEIS as a shrub or small tree and the Flora of North America as shrubby; the record files it as a shrub, like the catalog's other clumping yuccas. Each flowering stalk blooms once, and at one study site only plants with a trunk at least 4 inches thick flowered (FEIS).

Propagation

FEIS reports that seed soaked for 24 hours and kept moist at 82 to 90°F germinated in 6 days, and that seedlings grew best at a soil temperature of 64°F. Plants For A Future sows in spring under glass after a soak, with germination in 1 to 12 months at 68°F, and also takes root cuttings in late winter or early spring, lifting the plant in April or May to take small buds from the base of the stem and the rhizomes. In the wild it spreads mostly by sprouts from short rhizomes, commonly 1 to 5 per plant (FEIS). Seed forms only after its yucca moth, or a gardener with a paintbrush, has moved the pollen.

Native range

Native

Naturalized

Native across 3 US states; naturalized in 1 US state.

Native ecoregions

Naturally belongs in 11 ecoregions - its native range crosses a state or province each one spans (not necessarily this exact habitat).

California coastal sage and chaparral

Central Pacific Northwest coastal forests

Central-Southern Cascades Forests

Chihuahuan desert

Klamath-Siskiyou forests

Mojave desert

Northern California coastal forests

Sierra Nevada forests

Sonoran desert

Also called red elderberry, this is a deciduous shrub or small tree native across North America and Europe: in North America from Alaska and Yukon to Labrador and Newfoundland, south to California and New Mexico and, in the mountains, to North Carolina and Georgia. It grows in moist woods, stream banks, forest gaps and mountain openings, 8 to 12 feet tall in gardens and up to about 20 feet in the wild, with large, deeply divided leaves, dome-shaped clusters of tiny white flowers early in spring as the leaves unfold, and bright red berries in summer that birds strip quickly. Know its hazards before planting: the USDA Forest Service's Fire Effects Information System (Fryer 2008) says the fruits and seeds may cause vomiting and diarrhea, especially when not fully ripe, and that other parts of the plant may be poisonous year-round. It is a plant of cool, moist sites; FEIS says it tolerates warm climates less well than blue elderberry.

Climate notes

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Only one source checked here gives a zone range: Plants For A Future lists USDA hardiness zones 9 to 10, the range used here, and UK zone 8. No source checked here gives a minimum temperature, and its wild range climbs to about 5,900 feet (FEIS), so the cold edge rests on that one source. NC State Extension has no page for it, USDA PLANTS gives no growing characteristics, and the Missouri Botanical Garden was unreachable this session and not read.

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The native range here is taken from Kew's World Checklist of Vascular Plants (WCVP), the dataset POWO publishes: Arizona, California and Nevada, and northwestern Mexico. WCVP records no introduced range.

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The state list here follows the Wildflower Center and FEIS, which both include Utah; FEIS and Wikipedia place it in Washington County in the southwest of the state. WCVP and the Flora of North America do not list Utah. FEIS describes the range as southernmost Nevada, northwestern Arizona and California north to San Bernardino County and west to the Pacific coast, reaching its southern limit in Baja California.

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In the wild it grows in hot, arid desert scrub and chaparral, mostly below about 5,900 feet, on gravelly, often calcareous soil (FEIS). FEIS describes summers often above 100°F in the Ysidro Mountains of San Diego County and an average rainfall of 6 inches a year at one site in southern Nevada, and in a southern Nevada canyon its numbers held steady through a severe drought winter.

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Sources disagree on bloom time, so the record gives no bloom period. FEIS says it flowers in late winter or early spring, with dates from March to May across its range, the Flora of North America late winter to early spring, and the Wildflower Center April to May, while Plants For A Future, one of the two sources whose bloom period is checked here, gives early fall, and USDA PLANTS, the other, gives none.

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Plants For A Future, the only source checked here that states a soil pH, gives mildly acid to mildly alkaline, so the record gives no soil pH. FEIS describes wild soils as often gravelly and calcareous, but reports that seedlings grown with added calcium carbonate made lighter shoots.

Plant this, not that

Better fit for this place

For Chicago, IL, these are replacement suggestions: similar plants with a stronger hardiness fit now and/or in 2050.

Sambucus racemosa

Red elder

A tree-like yucca of the desert grasslands, mesas and desert hillsides of west Texas, New Mexico, Arizona and northern Mexico, also called palmilla, Spanish for "small palm". Young plants look like a coarse bunchgrass of very narrow, white-edged leaves; with age they build one or several trunks, thatched with dead leaves and each topped by a round head of fine leaves, 3.9 to 14.8 feet tall by the Flora of North America's figures. From late spring into early summer a flowering stalk 3 to 7 feet long rises above the leaves, with 25 to 30 side branches of creamy-white bells. It grows very slowly, about 1 inch a year by the Wildflower Center's estimate, and wants full sun, coarse, fast-draining soil and almost no water. Two things to weigh first: the leaves are sharply pointed, so it belongs away from paths, and a dug-up plant rarely survives a move, so start with a small container plant. Seed depends on the yucca moth, its only pollinator. The name comes from the soapy substance in its roots and trunk, once used as soap, and the ASPCA lists yuccas as toxic to dogs, cats and horses.

Better fit now and in 2050

Now: well-suited

2050: well-suited

Yucca elata

Soaptree yucca

Better fit now and in 2050

Now: well-suited

2050: well-suited

Sambucus canadensis

American elderberry

A fast, suckering native shrub of streambanks and moist thickets across eastern North America, grown for huge flat-topped cymes of tiny lemon-scented white flowers in early summer and the clusters of dark elderberry drupes that follow. Spreads by root suckers into naturalized colonies 5 to 12 feet tall and wide; the flowers feed butterflies and the showy fruit feeds birds. The raw berries are not eaten fresh - they are cooked into jelly, pie, and wine.

Sambucus nigra ssp. cerulea

Better fit now and in 2050

Now: well-suited

2050: well-suited

Blue elderberry

A large multi-stemmed native shrub-to-small-tree of western North America, named for the dusty powder-blue drupes that ripen in late summer over a waxy bloom. Flat-topped creamy-white flower cymes up to 10 inches across rise above pinnately compound serrated foliage in early summer, drawing birds and butterflies. The cooked fruit is edible and prized for jelly, pie, and wine, but the plant earns a "high maintenance" note for suckering, wind/snow breakage, and a roster of fungal and insect pests.

Also called red elderberry, this is a deciduous shrub or small tree native across North America and Europe: in North America from Alaska and Yukon to Labrador and Newfoundland, south to California and New Mexico and, in the mountains, to North Carolina and Georgia. It grows in moist woods, stream banks, forest gaps and mountain openings, 8 to 12 feet tall in gardens and up to about 20 feet in the wild, with large, deeply divided leaves, dome-shaped clusters of tiny white flowers early in spring as the leaves unfold, and bright red berries in summer that birds strip quickly. Know its hazards before planting: the USDA Forest Service's Fire Effects Information System (Fryer 2008) says the fruits and seeds may cause vomiting and diarrhea, especially when not fully ripe, and that other parts of the plant may be poisonous year-round. It is a plant of cool, moist sites; FEIS says it tolerates warm climates less well than blue elderberry.

Full sun / Part shade

Better fit now and in 2050

Now: well-suited

2050: well-suited

Similar plants

Browse lateral options with similar roles, light needs, size, or native-range overlap; these are not filtered for a better climate fit.

Sambucus racemosa

Red elder

A tree-like yucca of the desert grasslands, mesas and desert hillsides of west Texas, New Mexico, Arizona and northern Mexico, also called palmilla, Spanish for "small palm". Young plants look like a coarse bunchgrass of very narrow, white-edged leaves; with age they build one or several trunks, thatched with dead leaves and each topped by a round head of fine leaves, 3.9 to 14.8 feet tall by the Flora of North America's figures. From late spring into early summer a flowering stalk 3 to 7 feet long rises above the leaves, with 25 to 30 side branches of creamy-white bells. It grows very slowly, about 1 inch a year by the Wildflower Center's estimate, and wants full sun, coarse, fast-draining soil and almost no water. Two things to weigh first: the leaves are sharply pointed, so it belongs away from paths, and a dug-up plant rarely survives a move, so start with a small container plant. Seed depends on the yucca moth, its only pollinator. The name comes from the soapy substance in its roots and trunk, once used as soap, and the ASPCA lists yuccas as toxic to dogs, cats and horses.

A fast, suckering native shrub of streambanks and moist thickets across eastern North America, grown for huge flat-topped cymes of tiny lemon-scented white flowers in early summer and the clusters of dark elderberry drupes that follow. Spreads by root suckers into naturalized colonies 5 to 12 feet tall and wide; the flowers feed butterflies and the showy fruit feeds birds. The raw berries are not eaten fresh - they are cooked into jelly, pie, and wine.

Banana yucca, also called datil or blue yucca, is a low, fleshy-fruited yucca of the dry plains, grasslands, rocky slopes and woodlands of the US Southwest, from west Texas to southern Colorado, Utah, Nevada and California, and of northern Mexico. It grows as a single stemless rosette or an open clump of rosettes, usually wider than tall, of rigid, bluish-green leaves up to 30 inches long that each end in a stiff spine, so plant it well back from paths. From spring into early summer a stalk up to 3.3 feet tall carries large, waxy, cream-white bells, often tinged red-purple, followed by fat, fleshy, banana-shaped fruit that was a traditional food across the Southwest. Only its yucca moth pollinates it, so a garden plant sets fruit only where the moth lives or by hand. Give it full sun or light shade and dry, rocky or sandy, well-drained soil, lime included; it is very drought tolerant and grows slowly. The ASPCA lists yuccas as toxic to dogs, cats and horses.

Sambucus nigra ssp. cerulea

Blue elderberry

A large multi-stemmed native shrub-to-small-tree of western North America, named for the dusty powder-blue drupes that ripen in late summer over a waxy bloom. Flat-topped creamy-white flower cymes up to 10 inches across rise above pinnately compound serrated foliage in early summer, drawing birds and butterflies. The cooked fruit is edible and prized for jelly, pie, and wine, but the plant earns a "high maintenance" note for suckering, wind/snow breakage, and a roster of fungal and insect pests.

A western North American native large shrub or small multi-stemmed tree that erupts in clouds of magenta-pink pea-family flowers along bare branches in early spring - often before the leaves expand. The round, heart-shaped blue-green leaves with palmate venation follow, and flat 2-4 inch seed pods ripen burgundy-red and persist into winter. A drought-tolerant, butterfly- and bee-supporting native of dry slopes from northern California east to southern Utah and south to Arizona.

Full sun / Part shade