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Araceae family

Heart Of Jesus Caladium bicolor

Heart Of Jesus is an introduced perennial herb, found in the lower 48 states, the Pacific Basin, and Puerto Rico. It blooms Apr – May.

More about this plant

Caladium bicolor, called Heart of Jesus, is a species in the genus Caladium from Latin America. It is grown as a houseplant for its large, heart or lance-shaped leaves with striking green, white, pink, and red blotching. Hundreds of cultivars are available. It can be planted outside in USDA Hardiness Zone 10 as an ornamental. It is a problematic invasive species in Trinidad and Tobago, Guam, Micronesia, Palau, Hawaii and the Philippines, and naturalized populations can be found in most of the rest of the world's tropics, including Africa, the Indian subcontinent, southeast Asia and Malesia. Wikipedia →

⚠ Invasive here — plant a native instead USDA + GBIF

Heart Of Jesus is flagged invasive in the U.S. These natives fill a similar niche — same growth habit, bloom season, height, and region — so you keep the look and feed local wildlife instead of spreading a problem.

Romerillo
Native
Romerillo
Bidens alba
●●●●○
Sweet Acacia
Native
Sweet Acacia
Vachellia farnesiana
●●●●○
Malva De Caballo
Native
Malva De Caballo
Malachra capitata
●●●○○
Spiny Amaranth
Native
Spiny Amaranth
Amaranthus spinosus
●●○○○
Matched on growth habit · bloom months · mature height · shared U.S. range (USDA + GBIF) — a starting point, not a prescription.

Growing & care

USDA PLANTS · TRY
Conditions
Sources · Conditions
Cold hardiness (derived) — Hardiness
Hardiness
≥ zone 10 derived from its U.S. range
Size & form
Sources · Size & form
USDA PLANTS — Lifespan
TRY Plant Trait Database (CC BY 4.0) — Foliage
Lifespan
Perennial
Foliage
Broadleaf
In the garden
Herb layer — Sits in the herb of a layered food forest or polyculture.Open guide →
derived roles
The garden year bloom → fruit → fall colour
J
F
M
A
M
J
J
A
S
O
N
D
Bloom
Bloom (the flower's colour)
Bloom · Apr – May — 11 obs · Herbarium specimens — Park et al. 2023 (CC BY 4.0)
Species characteristics from USDA PLANTS (public domain) + TRY (CC BY) — general guidance, not a guarantee for your exact site. Deer "browsing" is documented palatability, not a deer-proof claim.
How we know this (1) Methods & honest limits
Photosynthesis Direct fact

A recorded categorical fact: each species is tagged C3 (standard), C4 (heat/water-efficient) or CAM (succulent, night-time CO₂ uptake) — or a facultative combination. We only show a trait card for the noteworthy C4/CAM cases; C3 is the unremarkable majority, kept in the data but not surfaced as a card.

Kattge, J. et al. TRY plant trait database — Categorical Traits Dataset (2012).
Derived values are computed from open data by a published method — labelled, cited, and never shown as a direct observation. Full methodology →
Sources for this entry (16) Open & cited
[01] Scientific name & family — USDA PLANTS (DwCA, Zenodo 17903503)
[02] Growth habit & duration — USDA PLANTS (DwCA, Zenodo 17903503)
[03] Native status & distribution — USDA PLANTS (DwCA, Zenodo 17903503)
[04] Common name — USDA PLANTS (via GBIF)
[05] Invasive / introduced status — US-RIIS v2.0 (USGS)
[06] Wetland indicator — USACE National Wetland Plant List (2022)
[08] Description — Wikipedia (CC BY-SA)
[09] Ecological value — GloBI
[12] Photosynthetic pathway — TRY Plant Trait Database (CC BY 4.0)
[13] Cold hardiness (derived) — Derived from U.S. range × USDA PHZM zones
[16] County range — GBIF Open Data — open-licensed occurrences (CC0/CC-BY) → county
Spot an error or have a better photo? Every field links to its source, and the whole dataset is open.
Cite this page Open data, please attribute

PlantKey’s data is open under CC BY-SA 4.0 — free to reuse and adapt, with attribution and the same licence. Photos keep their own per-image licence + credit (see Sources above).

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