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Cissus tuberosa (Tuberous Grape) - A peculiar fast growing winter deciduous vine that develops a large gray irregularly rounded caudex at its base that can be 10 inches in diameter with smaller elongated caudexes or swellings at each node of the up to 3-foot-long twining stems holding green deeply cut palmate leaves that drop off in late fall and having tendrils that clasp onto items for support. These stem caudexes will root out if laying on or near soil and if grown in sun or bright light it will produce small greenish flowers which may be followed by small clusters of dark fruits.
Plant in full sun to part shade in a well-drained soil and irrigate occasionally - with its water storing caudex it is quite forgiving of missing an occasional watering and this also helps check rampant growth. It tolerates high heat conditions and is cold hardy to around 25 °F. This unusual plant makes an interesting container or even bonsai specimen but one must keep in mind its rapid and wide spreading characteristics.
Cissus tuberosa is native to Puebla, Mexico, where it can be found in rocky outcrops up to around 5,000 feet. Cissus tuberosa was first described with this name by the Swiss botanist and naturalist Augustin Pyramus de Candolle in 1824, but most now consider this name to be a synonymous with Cissus tiliacea, a plant described three years earlier by the German botanist Carl Sigismund but we continue to use this older name so not to confuse our customers or staff. The name for the genus comes from the Greek word 'kissos' that means "ivy" and the specific epithet means a "bulbous plant". The epithet 'tiliacea' would mean Linden-like, in reference to some perceived similarity in the rounded leaves to the Linden (Tilia) genus. The International Succulent Introduction (ISI) program made a clone of this species a 2024 introduction as ISI 2024-10 Cissus tileacea, noting that this clone, originally collected by Bill Baker in 1985 in Puebla, Mexico has leaves more glaucous than the typical form long grown in the succulent trade. We don't know how different the ISI clone is from our first stock plant that came to us in 2005 with the succulent collection of Alice Waidhofer. Alice's information was that she had purchased the plant in 1971 from Clara Littlefield of Littlefield's Cactus Nursery in Rio Linda, California.
This information about Cissus tuberosa displayed is based on research conducted in our horticultural library and from reliable online resources. We also will relate observations made about it as it grows in our nursery gardens and other gardens we have visited, as well how the crops have performed in containers in our nursery field. We will also incorporate comments that we receive from others and we welcome hearing from anyone with additional information, particularly if they can share any cultural information that would aid others in growing it.
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