Fruit Salad Plant

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Fruit Salad Plant - Monstera deliciosa

Monstera deliciosa is the climbing aroid behind the classic Queensland tropical garden, carrying huge glossy leaves that split and perforate as they mature into the familiar windowed pattern. In the ground it forms a broad, sprawling clump on thick stems that drop cord like aerial roots, and given a tree trunk or masonry wall it will climb. The common name comes from the long, scaled fruit borne on mature plants, which ripens slowly over many months and tastes of banana and pineapple once fully ripe.

Why Fruit Salad Plant

Signature Leaf: Mature leaves grow very large and deeply split, so even a single plant reads as a bold tropical statement.
Deep Shade Tolerance: Under a dense tree canopy or on the south side of a house the leaves stay large and dark green, though they split less in very low light.
Indoors or Out: The same plant grows outdoors in frost free gardens or as a long lived specimen in a bright interior.
Sap and Unripe Fruit: The leaves, stems and green fruit hold needle like oxalate crystals that sting and swell the lips and tongue if chewed, so keep toddlers and pets away from it and handle cut stems with gloves on.
Weed Risk: It is recorded as naturalised in bushland in parts of South East Queensland, so plant it well back from bush edges and creek lines and dispose of prunings in green waste.

Ideal Applications

Resort Style Massing: Planted in sweeps beneath palms and established shade trees, it puts the boldest leaf in the garden at waist to head height.
Shaded Courtyard Feature: Set on a freestanding support a little off a rendered or timber wall, a single plant gives a dramatic silhouette in a small, dim space without its aerial roots marking the paint or render.
Trunk and Wall Cover: Trained onto a mature tree trunk or an unpainted masonry retaining wall, its aerial roots grip and carry the leaves upward.
Large Interior Planter: Indoors it needs a heavy, broad pot close to an east or north facing window, with a sturdy moss pole if it is to grow upward rather than sprawl.

Specimen & Installation

Spacing (feature/avenue): 3 to 4m, so each clump can spread without crowding
Best Planting Season: October to March outdoors, once the risk of a cold night has passed; indoor placement suits any month
Soil & Drainage: Deep, moisture holding soil enriched with compost or leaf mould; it copes with heavier ground provided water does not lie around the stems
Establishment Care: Soak it every few days through its first summer so the soil stays moist but never sodden, and keep a thick blanket of leaf litter or coarse compost over the roots. Give a handful of organic pellet fertiliser in October and again in January, and cut yellowing lower leaves off at the stem with gloved hands.

Plant Details

Height: 2 to 3m as a freestanding clump, climbing higher on a tree
Width: 2 to 4m
Growth Rate: Moderate, faster through warm humid summers
Foliage: Evergreen, large glossy split leaves
Light: Dappled light or bright shade outdoors, bright indirect light indoors; hot afternoon sun yellows and scorches the leaves
Native to: Southern Mexico and Central America
Flower Colour: Insignificant; mature plants produce a thick creamy hood around a flower spike, and the spike ripens into the edible fruit