Aspidistras or cast iron plants would become very popular plants during the reign of Queen Victoria—they are tough houseplants that tolerate low light, poor soil, low humidity and infrequent watering—perfect for the dim gas lit homes of city dwellers during the 19th century.

Aspidistra lurida is a smaller species than its more common cousin, Aspidistra elatior. The leaves are narrow and arch gracefully. As cut foliage, they last a month in a vase. The purplish-brown flowers arise from the rhizome. Nestled among leaf litter, they look somewhat like a small fungus and are seldom noticed except by their pollinators. And Aspidistra may have the strangest pollinators of all—mollusks. Yes, snails and slugs.

Long before Westerners discovered these easy care houseplants, the Chinese and Japanese were cultivating Aspidistra. The variety ‘Ginga’ (Japanese for galaxy) has spots across the leaves like stars across the night sky. It is an old selection, possibly one of the first to grace Japanese gardens.

In the U.S., this plant is often sold as Aspidistra ‘Milky Way’, but the true ‘Milky Way’ (or Amanogawa in Japanese) has bold white stripes as well as spots.

 

(Compiled from: “Aspidistra”, W3Tropicos, James Solomon, Missouri Botanical Garden’s VAST nomenclatural database; “Aspidistra”, A-Z Encyclopedia of Garden Plants, C. Brickell and J.D. Zuk, The American Horticultural Society, DK Publishing, NY, 1997; “Aspidistra”, Asiatica Nursery, Lewisberry, PA, 2007)