Soapweed Is a Drought-tolerant Perennial with Dramatic Flowers

Virtues: Soapweed, or Yucca glauca, is a succulent plant with grasslike yet stiff foliage and impressive spikes of white flowers. This long-lived perennial thrives in drought.

Common name: Soapweed, plains yucca

Botanical name:Yucca glauca

Exposure: Full sun

Season: Year-round for foliage, late spring for flowers

Flowers: Mature soaped will bloom in late spring, sending up a flower spike from the center of the rosette. The flower spike is thickly lined with large, drooping, white blossoms. It can grow to four feet tall.

Foliage: Stiff, spiky leaves resemble wide blades of grass.

Habit: The foliage forms a tight rosette to 20 inches tall and 36 inches wide. Soapweed is an evergreen perennial.

Origins: Dry plains and sandhills of the interior western and Great Plains of the United States and to western Canada.

How to grow soapweed: Site this yucca in full sun and well-drained soil. This native of the western Great Plains tolerates heat and drought in stride. USDA Zones 4–8.

Image credit: AlanMajchrowicz / Photodisc / GettyImages