$58 · Pilea/Chinese Money Plant

Pilea peperomioides / UFO Plant / Chinese Money Plant in Chinese money pot decorated with two dragons. Indoor plant with low maintenance. No delivery. Pick up in the core of Sidney. If the ad is up it is available. No longer answering Is it still available question. Its origin was a mystery for a long time. It was popular as a houseplant for decades, but more or less unknown to science. At some point, in trying to solve the mystery of P. peperomioides, people became desperate enough to turn to the public. On January 9, 1983, an article was published in the British Sunday Telegraph requesting that the Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew be notified if anyone had information about the plants origin. Thanks to the information received after the article, the origin of the UFO plant was finally clarified: It had come to Europe in 1946 through the Norwegian diplomat Agnar Espegren, who had to leave China and brought the plant with him. This trail then led first to Kunming (Yunnan) and finally to Dali. Expeditions to the mountains around Dali then confirmed the origin of the plant and finally herbarium specimens from 1906 and 1910 were found afterwards, where the plant was described for the first time and got its name. Pilea peperomioides originates from the mountains around the city of Dali of the southern Chinese province of Yunnan. It grows there at altitudes from 1500 to 3000m, usually in only a very thin layer of humus directly on the rocks. So it is by no means a tropical plant from hot, stuffy rainforests but really tough. It withstands damp, cool temperatures well (possibly even frost) but also hot, rather dry periods. This adaptability and robustness also makes it such a popular houseplant. It has a woody, sparsely branched trunk that can grow about 30 to 50cm tall and round, peltate, succulent leaves. Its flowers are small and inconspicuous. Male flowers are whitish, female flowers are slightly larger and pale red.