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Yucca filamentosa L.
Adam's Needle
Common Yucca
Florida native
A frequent plant of sandhills and dry bluff forests in much of the state except the southern tip. The range extends throughout the southeastern states and west into Texas to Nebraska, north to the Great Lakes states and northeast into Massachusetts.
Y. filamentosa is one of the Florida yuccas with the leaf margins fraying into filamentous threads, in the case of this species the fibers may be up to 20cm (nearly 8 in.) long. The lanceolate leaves are typically in a basal rosette, the leaves being 2-4cm (3/4 to 1-1/2 in.) wide and 50-75cm (20-30 in.) long. The nearly white flowers hang like pendents in dense tightly ascending panicles at the top of a scape-like stalk 1-3m (3-10 ft.) tall and up to 2.5cm (1 in.) in diameter. The sepals are much narrower than the petals.
Yucca filamentosa is a member of the Agavaceae - Century-plant family.
Other species of the Yucca genus in the Wild Florida Photo database:
Yucca aloifolia - SPANISH BAYONET
Yucca flaccida - WEAK-LEAF YUCCA
Yucca gloriosa - MOUNDLILY YUCCA
Atlas of Florida Vascular Plants (Institute for Systemic Botany) profile for this species
iNaturalist profile for this species
USDA Plant Profile for this species
For more information on this species, visit the following link:
Flora of North America page for this species
Date record last modified: Oct 16, 2025
