This plant has got to be close to 50 years old. I brought it and a bunch of other container plants with me when I relocated from my childhood home.
My late mother planted it in a patio area planter that got a touch of afternoon sunlight.

I placed it in a pot before moving, and it has been in a pot since (8 yrs).

After much procrastination, I finally put it into the ground. I'd like to know 1) what it is, 2) how to care for it and manage its size and spread.

Thank very much!

Its a mature Monstera deliciosa. Its a climbing aroid native to Mexico. Its a very tough, resilient plant.
It wants to climb, and is what is called a hemi-epiphyte. It will either crawl across the ground until it bumps up agains a support, latch on to it and start to climb (a tree, a post, a fence or your house) or, in the wild, they frequently start up in the trees without any contact with the ground, germinate on a tree branch or rock outcropping, and send roots down, stuck to the tree or cliff to the soil below. Roots born this way can reach 30+ feet.
If its been growing outside all this time, and is in the same climate that it started in (ie it doesn't freeze) you can plant it in your yard up against a tree or other structure and it will climb, stuck to whatever you put it on.
Or, you can keep in in a container with no support, and it will, for lack of a better word, sprawl.

These are examples of climbing plants...on a wall

on a rock pile

on a tree

on a fence



sprawling in a flowerbed

They like regular water, and they climb in order to get more light, so some direct light is fine. The plant in the very last photo is acclimated to full sun

What a great visual tutorial, Gina !

Thanks!

Gina1960 said: Its a mature Monstera deliciosa. Its a climbing aroid native to Mexico. Its a very tough, resilient plant.
It wants to climb, and is what is called a hemi-epiphyte. It will either crawl across the ground until it bumps up agains a support, latch on to it and start to climb (a tree, a post, a fence or your house) or, in the wild, they frequently start up in the trees without any contact with the ground, germinate on a tree branch or rock outcropping, and send roots down, stuck to the tree or cliff to the soil below. Roots born this way can reach 30+ feet.
If its been growing outside all this time, and is in the same climate that it started in (ie it doesn't freeze) you can plant it in your yard up against a tree or other structure and it will climb, stuck to whatever you put it on.
Or, you can keep in in a container with no support, and it will, for lack of a better word, sprawl.

These are examples of climbing plants...on a wall

on a rock pile

on a tree

on a fence



sprawling in a flowerbed

They like regular water, and they climb in order to get more light, so some direct light is fine. The plant in the very last photo is acclimated to full sun

Thank you for this! When I pulled the plant from the pot, I managed to keep the trunk that ran horizontally over the ground, intact. I then planted the ball right where the pot was. It's adjacent to a lemon tree trunk and a wall. There are rooting structures attached to the trunk, and the trunk goes in the opposite direction of the wall and tree. Am I able to "detach" the rooting structures of the trunk and direct the plant toward the wall and tree so that it may climb? THX!
(You can see the trunk and wall in the 2nd photo that I posted.)

Yes, you can gently unearth those adventitous roots that have grown into soil and redirect them toward the tree