Philodendron vs Pothos
@capirani (2840)
United States
June 5, 2024 10:00pm CST
Which is which and what happened in the last 50 years?
Back in the 1970s when I was in my later teens and early twenties, I had a houseplant book that I used all the time with my houseplants. I loved indoor gardening, and I was very good at salvaging plants others thought were dead. Many of my plants came from grocery stores where I would find plants that were very wilted and/or dying and ask if I could have them since nobody would be buying them. I almost always got them for free. Then I would take them home and nurse them back to health. I had this great book for identification and care of all types of houseplants. My mom thought I should go into some type of plant hospital business. LOL
So, back in the day I never heard of a pothos plant. They were all called philodendrons. Haha, this spellcheck does not even recognize pothos as a word. What they now call a golden pothos was a variegated philodendron back then. Nothing was called a pothos. I still call them all philodendrons. I have no clue when they messed with changing the names.
Both philodendrons and pothos plants come from the same aroid family (Araceae). Maybe back then there was no separation. I don't know. My entire life I have called all these types of plants the names given them in that old book which I no longer have. It was only in the past couple of years that I ever heard of pothos. The person who said my variegated philodendron was a pothos would not hear of any of it that in my past it was always called a philodendron. This person is young enough to have been my daughter and she just talked to me like I knew nothing about my plants.
Anyway, what do you think? Philodendron or pothos? In my mind it will always be philodendron and all the varieties will be some of my favorite house plants.
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