SCINDAPSUS PICTUS 'SUPHA10'

ORIGIN:

Kanchana Khemakongkanond, Chonburi, Thailand; US Plant Patent PP21,321, 2010

CULTIVAR DESCRIPTION:

A compact sport of 'Exotica' with exceptionally dark green foliage and round, broad leaves, wider and much darker than those of its parent.¹

NOTES:

STATUS - Not yet accepted by the International Aroid Society, though not merely a market name: the clone is established by a United States plant patent, which describes and fixes it. As of September 2026 the IAS Aroid Cultivar Registry holds no record of this name. A patent and a registration are different things.

1. Discovered in the summer of 1999 as a chance whole-plant mutation among plants of the unpatented commercial variety Scindapsus pictus 'Exotica' in a commercial nursery in Chonburi, Thailand; the patent was filed on 6 June 2009 and granted on 28 September 2010 to Kanchana Khemakongkanond.¹

2. The patent gives no trade name, and no plant is sold under the code; the dark, broad-leaved 'Exotica' sports offered as 'Jade Satin' and 'Black Mamba' are candidates, but no source connects them to the patent.¹

STORY:

STORY TITLE: A Thai sport with a code for a name

In the summer of 1999 Kanchana Khemakongkanond noticed one plant among a batch of the unpatented commercial variety Scindapsus pictus 'Exotica' in a commercial nursery in Chonburi, Thailand, that was not like the others: compact, with round, broad leaves of an exceptionally dark green. It was a chance whole-plant mutation, and it was propagated on by cuttings until, ten years later, an application for a United States plant patent was filed on June 6th, 2009. The patent, PP21,321, was granted on September 28th, 2010, to the inventor under the denomination 'SUPHA10', the first plant patent ever issued for a Scindapsus.¹

The patent describes the plant only by contrast with its parent: wider leaves of a much darker color on a more compact plant. It gives no trade name, and none has been attached to the code since; the broad, dark, silverless sports of 'Exotica' that the trade sells as 'Jade Satin' and 'Black Mamba' answer the description, but no source connects either to the patent. Thirteen years later a second patented Scindapsus, 'Silver Baby', went the other way, toward an almost wholly silver leaf.¹,²

REFERENCES:

1. Khemakongkanond, K. 2010. Scindapsus plant named 'SUPHA10'. US Plant Patent PP21,321

2. Keil, T. 2023. Scindapsus plant named 'Silver Baby'. US Plant Patent PP35,151

Plate from US Plant Patent PP21,321