THE CALIFORNIA YUCCA 
69 
THE CALIFORNIA YUCCA 
TN the southwestern United States, Mexico, and Central America 
^ thrives a shrub, and sometimes a tree, known as the Yucca. Yucca 
is an Indian name erroneousy transferred to these plants from the 
mianihot, a South American plant from 
the fleshy and starchy roots of which 
tapioca is made. Yucca was at one 
time one of the resources of the native 
tribes (Indians) of the deserts of Cal¬ 
ifornia for fibers, it being manufac¬ 
tured into blankets, cards, mats, and 
baskets. 
The yucca belongs to the lily fam¬ 
ily. There are about twenty different 
species, but we shall consider only the 
species known as Spanish bayonet. 
This plant is one that knows how? to 
meet hard times; it can gather and 
store moisture enough to flourish in 
the deserts. It makes and stores so 
much food that, when the right season 
comes, usually in May, there shoots up 
in a few days a stem ten or fifteen feet 
high, bearing one of the most beautiful 
flower-clusters I have ever seen. 
A yucca-plant in bloom I n i the accompanying picture you 
will notice the enormous size of this plant and perhaps wonder at its 
being called a plant of the lily family. This yucca is an unusually large 
one. It measures about twenty feet in height and about ten inches in 
diameter at the base. At the summit the flowers run up in the form of 
a pinnacle for about eight feet. At the base are large dagger-like 
leaves about three feet long and six inches wide. These bayonet- 
shaped leaves taper to the apex, from which projects a large thorn. 
The leaves can defend themselves so well that tills species of yucca 
has been called Spanish bayonet, and I assure you that the stabs which 
this one gave me when I approached its base were not at all pleasant 
After this plant matures, the stem that shot up so rapidly in the 
