Showerthought: My friend called a fern a 'shade cactus' and it made me wonder about plant names.

I was helping a friend pick out a Boston fern for her apartment in Denver, and she kept calling it a 'shade cactus' because it didn't need much light. It matters because mixing up basic plant types like that can lead to giving them the wrong care. Has anyone else heard people use totally wrong names for common houseplants?

3 comments

3 Comments

miles5813mo ago

Fake aloe" is a disaster waiting to happen, for real.

alex_hall913mo ago

Heard my neighbor call a snake plant a "fake aloe" last week. She was about to try and use the leaves for sunburn relief before I stopped her. Some of these made up names are genuinely dangerous.

wesley_fox921mo ago

Hold up, someone was about to put snake plant on their sunburn? That's a whole new level of dangerous naming right there. Snake plant leaves have those needle-like crystals that can mess your skin up something fierce. I knew people got creative with plant names but using a toxic plant as first aid because it looks like aloe is literally asking for a bad time. Your neighbor probably would have ended up with a rash worse than the burn itself. Glad you caught her before she found out the hard way.