Easy Yucca Palm Care and Growing Tips

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Yucca plants are susceptible plants even though it’s generally easy to maintain the plant. Over time, most species of yucca plants would grow into big plants and trees, but this would take a long time, and you’ll have enough time to enjoy it while it still serves as an indoor plant.

If you want your yucca plant to grow big and strong, then caring for it is just the thing you need to do.

The good thing is that caring for yucca plant is not stressful; all it needs is an adequate amount of sunlight, water, nutrients, and adequate soil, and it will grow properly.

Below is the easiest yucca palm care and growing tips you should follow to grow the plant.

What Is Yucca Palm?

Yucca palms are fantastic plants with various varieties with just a few things in common. There are numerous types of yucca palms, but one of the popular ones is the yucca elephantine. This specie of yucca plant has a central trunk and leaves that grow in bunches at the side of the plant.

The back of these trees is produced with sawn-off yucca logs and is mostly mottled. One common thing that most yucca plants possess is pointy leaves, so when selecting them or touching them at your home, you should be careful, so you don’t get pricked by one.

How Big Do Yucca Palms Get?

There are a lot of species of yucca plants for you to determine the general size of these plants. Generally, smaller yucca palms grow from a range of 2′ to 4′ tall when they are left to grow inside.

Some of these plants’ varieties, like the Joshua tree, can also extend upwards to about 30′ feet. Their leaf width is not definite; it depends on how big the leaves of this plant decide to get.

See Also: Common Indoor Yucca Plant Problems & Solutions

Yucca Palm Care Guide

You would need to do many things for your yucca plants to grow healthy and strong. Some of these things a good plant owner should do for their plants, indoors or outdoors, are as follows:

1. Yucca Plant Watering

Yucca plants are not affected by drought generally but watering this plant wouldn’t hurt it. Regular watering of about an inch per week in spring and summer periods would make your plant survive through that weather.

Over the winter period, your plants would not require as much water anymore. It would help if you were careful when watering your plants because overwatering eventually leads to yellow leaves and soft roots.

2. Soil Type

Yucca plants are not so selective about the type of soil you should plant them in as long as the soil drains water properly to avoid root rot.

3. Fertilizer Application

Although yuccas do not necessarily need fertilizers, a standard liquid fertilizer won’t hurt as long as it is planted in spring or summer; these fertilizers are also beneficial to yucca plants grown indoors.

4. Propagative Means

You can plant your yucca plants from seeds, root cuttings, or even offsets but a different method of propagation also determines the time you should remove them.

 When propagating from offsets, remove them in spring and strip off the foliage from the plants; you should adequately water them until rear roots become strong enough and start growing.

You can take root cuttings from matured plants in the winter or the spring. Dig down about a 3-inch section from the existing root structure for your root cutting.

It would help if you didn’t plant immediately; keep the cutting in a cool, dry place for a couple of days before planting. It would help if you always produced it in not watered soil and in a location where it would not be directly under sunlight. The roots should begin to grow in about 3-4 weeks.

5. Pruning

Farmers prune to maintain your plants. Pruning is merely trimming the dead or damaged leaves from your bunch of leaves or flowers, and this is so simple that you can do it anytime.

You can also prune to reduce the plant back; cutting it back would reduce its size and cause it to grow slower, which is ideal for indoor plants. For your flower or plant type;

  • Cut off the top part of the trunk down to your desired size for a giant plant or tree. This method would leave a wound for a while, but with time, new offsets would begin to sprout from the part you cut from it. The growth of this part is not definite, so you must keep maintaining it until it all grows
  • For the stemless rosette and types, you can take off the dead and damaged leaves anytime you see that any of its leaves die off

6. Pests And Diseases

Although you are not likely to encounter any serious problems from pests and diseases, causes with cane borers and scale insects can occur. Your yucca leaves could develop brown leaves spot when it is watered over the head, so it is much better if you get it from the base of the plant.

Another problem you can encounter Is stem rot. It usually overs when the farmer does not properly drain the soil before planting. These plants are resistant to animals like deer because of their spiny nature.

7. Salt Toxicity

Although fluoride is not a significant threat to your plant, salt is. If you live in a high salt level area, your plant may likely respond with stunted growth, brown tips, or other leaf-related issues.

You can quickly flush the soil to save your plant because unless you act quickly, there might be no way you can keep your plant.

Why Are the Tips of My Yucca Plant Turning Brown?

One common reason why the tip of yucca plants turn brown is underwatering. If your yucca plant develops a brown and crispy dry tip, the first thought that should come to your mind is that it is not watered enough.

Although yucca plants do not need excess water or too much watering, that does not mean they can survive for long without water.

Underwatering is not always the problem; dry air can also be a solid cause. Yucca plants thrive better in medium levels of humidity and would struggle in homes with dry air.

A consistent lack of moisture will cause these leaves to dry up and form dry leaves. You can quickly fix this issue by either misting the plant, using a pebble tray or using a humidifier.

Apart from these two, fluoride toxicity is also a significant cause. Yucca plants are susceptible to the fluorides found in tap waters, so if you live in an area where hard water is found, this most likely is the cause.

To solve this, you can leave your watering can be filled with water out for two days so most of the chemicals will evaporate, or you can also collect enough rainwater for watering your plants.

Frequently Asked Questions

Do Yucca Plants Need Direct Sunlight?

Yucca plants need the exact opposite of direct sunlight. Yucca plants are drought-resistant and robust, but they should not be placed directly under sunlight; sufficient sun should be provided by placing them under indirect shade.

How Often Do You Water a Yucca Plant?

You should ensure that you water yucca plant once every ten days. You do not need to water yucca every day like most home plants because if you do that, you most likely run into the risk of overwatering.

To avoid overwatering, ensure that the roots of the plant sit well in the soil and plant these yucca plants in well-drained soil.

What Does an Overwatered Yucca Look Like?

When you overwater your yucca plants, they would have yellow leaves and droop due to the rotting of the leaves, which is majorly caused by overwatering.

The reason why this happens when you water too much is that when the amount of water is too much, oxygen is excluded in the soil hence the inability of the root’s respiration; this would cause a drooping appearance.

See Also: How To Save a Dying Yucca Plant

How Do I Rejuvenate a Dying Yucca?

If your yucca plants begin to wane, you can get quickly up your game in maintaining it to be able to revive it once again. For your yucca plant to bounce back to its initial form;

  • Make sure that you give it plenty of sunlight
  • Stop watering since yucca plants are highly susceptible to root rot
  • Keep the temperature constant because yucca plants do not do well in drastic temperature changes
  • Cut the trunk of the roots if root rot sets in