As we begin our new season of houseplant care, I think this would be a good time to explore how we got all of those beautiful foliage and flowering houseplants. They certainly aren’t native to our land. Many of them originated in far-off places around the globe. Think orchids from South America and the Philippines and the islands of the South Pacific. The philodendrons originated in the West Indies. Today, we call that area the Caribbean. And different varieties of our ornamental figs spanned the globe, different varieties originating in the South Pacific and all over Africa.
In today’s world, all this globetrotting would seem quite easy. You simply hop on a plane, go somewhere, hire a local guide and look for different plants. But how would you know if it has already been discovered? And if you did find something, you cannot imagine the trouble you would have getting by the plant inspectors at the airport. They are there to protect us from diseases and insects that we do not already have in our plant world. They are very meticulous. So, even today, it is not a small thing to bring in these plants.