Philodendron 'Pluto'

Where it comes from

Start with the name, because the one on the label is two names stacked. There is no cultivar called ‘Pluto Choco Empress’. The trade sells Philodendron ‘Pluto’, also offered as ‘Choco Empress’, and several sellers pair the two on the same listing.¹² Some stack a third and add ‘Caramel Marble’ to the title.

Beyond that the record is nearly empty, and the same searches came back with nothing as for the other trade cultivars here: no entry at Kew or IPNI for either name, no registration with the International Aroid Society’s cultivar registry,³ and no US plant patent for ‘Pluto’, ‘Choco Empress’ or ‘Caramel Marble’.⁴

Growers attribute it to Bob McColley’s Florida breeding programme in the 1960s or 70s.⁵ That is one claim repeated rather than two sources agreeing, and ‘Pluto’ appears in neither the published list of Bamboo Nursery releases nor UF/IFAS’s account of the self-heading hybrids.⁶ There is a thread of circumstantial support — ‘Red Empress’ is a documented release from that programme, so ‘Choco Empress’ reads as a name coined in the same house style — and that is as far as it goes.

Naming and description

The useful fact about this plant is its relationship to a much more expensive one. ‘Pluto’ is the plain green counterpart of ‘Caramel Marble’, the variegated collector’s plant. A specialist nursery selling ‘Pluto’ says so outright, and says where their stock comes from: reverted parts of their mother ‘Caramel Marble’ plant — adding that the variegation may randomly reappear.⁷ A named aroid grower confirms it from the other direction.⁵

So it is worth knowing which you have bought and why the prices differ so much, and worth knowing that a reverted plant is not guaranteed to stay reverted.

Habit is self-heading — a rosette on a short thick stem that will lean on a support with age rather than climb it. Most sources agree on that; a couple call it a climber, and one of those descriptions is copied word for word between two shops and describes a velvety heart-shaped leaf, which is a different plant altogether. Reported mature sizes run from about 30 cm to 1.5 m, and the leaf gets described as lobed, as serrated, as lance-shaped and as velvety heart-shaped depending on who is selling it. Expect a deeply cut, glossy, chocolate-toned leaf on an upright clump, and expect the listing photograph to be optimistic.

Fun facts

• You may have bought the expensive plant’s failure. ‘Pluto’ stock is substantially reverted ‘Caramel Marble’ — the nursery says so on its own product page — and the same page notes the variegation can return without warning.⁷ That makes it the rare houseplant where the cheap version may spontaneously turn into the dear one, which is a better reason to keep an eye on new growth than most.
• The name is a warning about names. A cultivar with no registration, no patent and no botanical record has picked up at least three trade names, and descriptions sold under one of them split into two incompatible plants.³ When two shops give word-for-word identical copy for a plant, that is one source, not two.
• “Self-heading” is a growth habit, not a size promise. These plants build a short vertical stem and throw leaves from a rosette rather than running up a pole, which is why the mature ones take floor space rather than height.⁶ The group is a Florida breeding invention — multi-species hybrids selected for exactly that shape — rather than a natural category.