Yuccarama! The untold story

Yucca faxoniana (left) and Y. thompsoniana (right) [2010]

Most first time visitors to Denver Botanic Gardens have been surprised to the large yuccas that flank the entrance to the main Boetcher building. There is a pretty good story behind them. The accesson number indicates it was accessioned in the year 2000--here you can see how much it grew in ten years--hang on to your hat--it grew a lot more subsequently!

Yucca faxoniana (lef), Y. thompsoniana (center)  and Y. rostrata (right) (2005?)

I think this is an even earlier picture--you can see the Y. faxoniana barely reaches the top of the door--maybe 7' tall. Yucca rostrata has photobombed on the right--there are a wealth of yuccas in what USED to be called the Crossroads gardens--six or more species--and a dozen or more treeform yuccas, almost all of which were donated to us by Mountain States nursery in Arizona.

Anoher view from 2010--Faxon's yucca grew well above the door here...back to history: Dan Johnson--now Assistant Director of Horticulture at DBG overseeing much of the outdoor gardens--has always had a love of Arizona. So much so that he now has a gorgeous second home in Tucson. For decades, however, he'd dash off to the desert whenever he could. He was planning a trip to the Sonoran when I suggested he drop in on Mountain States (I'd spoken at a conference with their CEO, Ron Gass) and see if he couldn't get a few of their new offerings for us to test...

Now we're at 2013--starting to leap up a tad!

I was thinking they'd give us a few gallons of novel Hesperaloes, for instance. Dan arranged a visit and was surprised to be greeted by a number of very interested MSN staff: "We've been thinking about Denver and would love to send some plants for trial" or words to that effect. Neither Dan nor I expected a very large semi-truck to park in front of DBG with a dozen or more enormous yuccas in large boxes. "Surely the most expensive annuals we'll ever plant here" I thought. Of course MSN knew they'd be hardy--and in the quarter century they've grown here they've thrived, some blooming spectacularly every year--even after our occasional Midwestern winter with lows below -20F!

We're up to 2020--after a typical March 21 snowstorm. That's Hesperaloe funifera on the right hand side, incidentally--another of their gifts that's performed fantastically.

TA DA! Here they are now!

I just took this picture on February 19: we thought the yuccas were enormous when they arrived in their boxes--maybe 5' tall at most. Faxon's now must rise to at least 20' and still growing. Mountain States (and their competitors) have had a field day selling these in the Denver area. A lot of visitors think they're palm trees! 

Yucca rostrata

All the various gardens clustered around the Crossroads (effectively the overture to a walk around the York Street gardens) have large groupings of various tree yuccas. Informally, gradually the whole area was dubbed "Yuccarama" by the staff--a name that seems to have stuck. I even saw it on the Gardens' handout map once. It is an appropriate name after all!

They are lovely any time of year, but when the Y. rostrata bloom on full moon nights the effect is magical!

They even upstaged the Chihuly exhibit when it was here! Of course, they are a wonderful biogeographical reminder that our Colorado flora has a large element of Madrean plants--plants whose center of origin is in Mexico. Much of Colorado was a Spanish colony once, and try as we may to exile and deny immigrants from the South--that's where much our characteristic flora--cacti and yuccas especially--have their centers of Origin. The orange fellow notwithstanding, we're really just North Mexico floristically! And these are proof...