Bernal, R., Gradstein, S.R. & Celis, M. (eds.). 2015. Catálogo de plantas y líquenes de Colombia. Instituto de Ciencias Naturales, Universidad Nacional de Colombia, Bogotá. http://catalogoplantasdecolombia.unal.edu.co
Bernal, R., G. Galeano, A. Rodríguez, H. Sarmiento y M. Gutiérrez. 2017. Nombres Comunes de las Plantas de Colombia. http://www.biovirtual.unal.edu.co/nombrescomunes/
CATE Araceae, 17 Dec 2011. araceae.e-monocot.org
Stout climber to 25 m, often with fertile hanging shoots; the adult leaves drooping. Seedling: a stolon-like creeper, 1 – 2 mm in diameter, to 2 m long. Juvenile: shingle plant, the lamina cordate, the sinus 5 – 10 mm deep, the apex mucronate; often variegated with silver flecks. Adult stem: elliptic in cross section, roughly warty or tuberculate, rarely smooth, dark green to tan, with a thick cuticle; internodes 3 – 10 cm long, 1 – 2 cm thick and 1.5 -3.0 cm wide; axillary bud in depression which is extended into a sulcus the length of the internode. Petiole: warty or tuberculate at the base or along its length, 20 – 55 cm long, vaginate to the geniculum, the sheath wings neatly deciduous, the geniculum 4 – 7 cm long. Lamina: oblong-ovate, falcate and oblique, coriaceous, dull dark green above, paler below, 20 – 100 cm long, 13 – 50 cm wide, 1 + ½ - 2 times longer than wide; the earliest adult leaves entire and some individuals mature in this state, later leaves pinnatifid, the larger pinnatifid and with 1 – 3 rows of elliptic perforations per side, the perforations 2 – 8 cm long, the pinnae truncate; the leaf base rounded to subcordate with a sinus 1 – 2 cm deep, never broadly cordate, the apex acute; primary lateral veins 9 – 18 in number, cream-colored and prominent abaxially, furrowed adaxially, the secondary lateral veins reticulate. Peduncle: tuberculate, 0.8 – 1.4 cm thick, terete, 5 – 9 cm long. Spathe: thickly coriaceous, pink abaxially, white adaxially, obovate, 6 – 12 cm tall, 4 – 6 cm across, shortly mucronate, or blunt at the apex, sometimes becoming curled-reflexed and splitting longitudinally before abscission. Flowering spadix: white, 5 – 10 cm long, 1.5 – 2.5 cm thick, the pistils bluntly truncate. Fruiting spadix: 7 – 14 cm long, 3.5 – 5.5 cm thick, pale yellow, the stylar portion of the pistils peeling off individually or in loosely fused groups to reveal the seeds in a gray pulp. Seeds: brown, oblong, 6 – 8 mm long, 4 – 5 mm wide, 2.0 – 3.5 mm thick, the embryo turquoise blue in color.
Monstera dubia is a handsome plant which grows at low elevations and it characteristically climbs and hangs on large trees. The vegetative adult stage is variable, relating in part to the type of tree in which it grows. The earliest adult leaves are entire, and if the individual is growing on an inadequate support it may flower at this stage. However, with a large tree to grow on it will produce first entire leaves, then pinnatifid ones, and finally pinnatifid-perforate leaves. These may have a drooping, falcate lamina to 1 meter in length and about half as wide. The species may flower as a climbing plant attached to the trunk; this is most common in Costa Rica and Panama. However, it often flowers at the ends of hanging shoots which may be several times branched, and this is the way it usually grows in South America.
The inflorescences of Monstera dubia are very distinctive. The spathe is obovate and blunt, rose to salmon-colored outside and white within. The common name, oreja de tigre/, refers to the shape of the intact spathe. It often splits longitudinally and curls up around the abaxial side before abscising. The spadices are white in flower, becoming green in early fruit and pale yellow at maturity. There is a geographic cline in spadix size,the largest ones being found in Costa Rica and smaller ones to the south and east.
The only other species with which Monstera dubia might be confused is M. punctulata, which is distinguished in flower by its large white spathes, and in fruit by its dark green or golden-green spadices. The petiole of M. punctulata is densely marked with white flecks, in contrast to the solid green petioles of M. dubia. A further distinction is in the lamina, which in M. punctulata is bright green and of a soft texture, and in M.dubia is dull dark green and thickly coriaceous.
Though a common and abundant species, Monstera dubia is represented in the world’s herbaria by fewer than 80 collections, more than one quarter of them from Barro Colorado Island. This reflects in part the lack of field botanists working in the Andean countries, as well as the nature of the species, which flowers well out of reach.
Extinction risk predictions for the world's flowering plants to support their conservation (2024). Bachman, S.P., Brown, M.J.M., Leão, T.C.C., Lughadha, E.N., Walker, B.E. https://nph.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/nph.19592
