Richard Moore Outdoor Report: Yucca Sunset

RIO GRANDE VALLEY, Texas (ValleyCentral) — The sun is setting on this year’s spring yucca flowering, and while there are still plenty of pita blooms petals are beginning to fall.

Each year, South Texas yuccas begin blossoming in January with peak flowering during late February and early March.

This year’s annual flourishing is spectacular with impressive stands of pitas heralding early spring in unison with bountiful creamy white flowers.

There are always some yuccas blooming as early as late December and others that don’t begin thrusting their bloom spikes skyward until mid-March, but that magical realm of peak flowering from late February through early March is perhaps the most enchanting time of year in southernmost Texas.

It is not just yuccas blooming this time of year, as chaparro prieto or black brush bursts forth with colorful clusters of yellow-gold flowers, and the sweet smell of huisache permeates wildlands flowering in harmony with peaking pitas.

Perched regally atop towering yucca bloom, a cara cara surveys this colorful domain, while nearby a white-tailed kite scans for prey from a similar lofty vantage.

The cara cara or totache as indigenous peoples called the raptor, occasionally pauses from its vigil to pluck petals, not so much to eat, but rather seemingly just for the amusement of flower picking.

As yucca flowers fall, ripe green seedpods appear, and just as petals provide food for wildlife like this chachalaca, savory seeds will also be eaten by creatures of the chaparral.

It takes approximately a month for yuccas to run their course from the bud's first appearance until rising to full flower and then fading.

From sunrise through sunset days pass quickly during this extraordinary flowering as pitas stretch skyward.

Scattered yuccas adorn vast coastal grassland as the sunset paints prairie sky pastels of fading pink.

Sun slips beyond the distant horizon, the moon rises to light night, and day comes full circle in the land of the yucca.