Thanks tarev! I love Hoya's ... and soooo many other plants!

Lin, you have some beautiful plants !!! I really like the H.obovata i think is what it was,with the round leaves.I will never get lucky enough to find one.I think i already have all that are available in my area.
How long have you had the H.pubicalyx? The stem are so thick!! I also noticed in the photo with the carnosa is the stem of an epi hanging there,what kind of epi is that?

Ok I will stop with the questions!! but your plants really are beautiful
Jelinda

Thanks Jalinda! I don't find many Hoya's for sale around these parts anymore. For a few years our local Home Depot, Lowes and Wal-Mart had a lot of the Exotic Angel plants and you could always find lacunosa, wayettii and carnosa. I got my Hoya obovata in a trade a few years ago and love the fragrance of that bloom.

The stem you see in that photo is not an Epiphyllum but rather Selenicereus anthonyanus, commonly called "Ric Rac Orchid Cactus": Zig-Zag Cactus (Selenicereus anthonyanus) I haven't seen a single bud on it this season!

Lin....your hoyas are beautiful!!!! I remember when yu complaned they didn't bloom.... no complaints now!!!! Yes...that carnosa isn't typical...probably a seedling someone passing off as a species (who doesn't knw the difference)... OK...nice plant. Leaves are interesting...

Thanks Carol ... I wasn't sure but figured that one hoya must be in the carnosa clan. The only carnosa I'm really familiar with are ( Rubra & Tricolor) the ones commonly called Krimson Princess and Krimson Queen.

Yep, there was a time when NO hoya wanted to bloom for me ... I think they've taught me a little patience.

Lin, thanks for the link to the ric rac orchid,I really thought that plant was an epi.If i had looked it up myself and seen the flowers i definitely would have thought it was an epi.

I am still trying to figure out what's what with them plants.Some say orchid cactus some epi's but some people call the same plants both and other say there is a difference in epi's and orchid cactus.It's hard to get a grasp on.My plants are still babies and from what i understand will be in their little pots aa couple years, so i have time to figure it out.

You do have very nice plants!!!!!

Jelinda: You are welcome! There are many plants commonly called "Orchid Cactus". I don't know where that name originated but it can be confusing; they aren't even related to Orchids! I always think of Orchid Cactus as those growing in the tree canopy of the rain forest and the really spiny/thorny Cactus as the sun loving type growing in the deserts of the Southwest. There are a lot of plants in the Genus Epiphyllum: http://garden.org/plants/brows... I'd love to find a pink blooming and red blooming variety of Epiphyllum! Both of the ones I have (Epiphyllum oxypetalum and E. hookeri) have white flowers but neither have thorns like the Selenicereus (Ric Rac).

There are also many plants in the Genus Selenicereus: http://garden.org/plants/brows... I think they are more like true cactus with thorns (although someone once told me that some Epiphyllum have thorns too.) I don't much like thorny plants and hate it when I get jabbed by the thorns of my Ric Rac but I've had the plant for many years and keep it around because of the pretty blooms that are so fragrant!

Yes, it gets very confusing when so many plants have the same common name, especially when they are from entirely different families of plants and require entirely different growing conditions!

Haha!! Bought this about six months ago for $ 7 at Lowes as 'tropical foliage' - thought 'it sure looks like a Hoya to me.....' here it is today....

Hetty: That's a beauty! It's definitely a Hoya, looks to be Hoya carnosa: Wax Plant (Hoya carnosa)

It could possibly be H. carnosa 'Tricolor', commonly called Krimson Queen Hoya: Krimson Queen Hoya (Hoya carnosa 'Tricolor')

It has the variegated leaves so I'm going with Tricolor! Thanks Lin!

Oh how lucky you are Hetty,why not me

I have been collecting Hoya's for more than a year and so far no flowers.My H. polyneura has peduncles that seem to have been the same size and haven't done anything for a month.I even brought it in out of the heat and put it in my bay window,so it gets warmer during the day and the a/c keeps it a little cooler at night.Which is what i understand is the conditions it likes to make it bloom.So far it's got peduncles,that's a start.I'm feeding it 15-30-15 and i give it super thrive and all my plants love super thrive.

All my Hoya's I have had 6-8 months have doubled in size since i purchased them.When i get them i keep them inside and feed with super thrive, when it has a good amount of new growth they are put in the general population.

I don't know what else i could do?I think now it's up to the plant and the right conditions for it to bloom.It down to which ones are cool,intermediate and warm growers.Maybe i will get some bloomers this fall or the beginning of next spring.I'm at the mercy of mother nature not having a green house.One of a hundred things in my list of things i want to do..

Jelinda: Very healthy looking Hoya's you have there ... great growing! The one in your first photo (Hoya carnosa 'Chelsea'): Wax Plant (Hoya carnosa 'Chelsea') is one I've had for a few years and it's never bloomed. I actually have two of them, one is a small plant from a cutting that I received in trade four years ago and the other is an Exotic Angel plant that I purchased at Home Depot a couple of years ago. I think I noticed a peduncle on the small plant but it's hanging out in a tree off the back deck and I need to check it more closely to see if what I'm seeing is actually a peduncle. Although I know the flower is pretty much like other carnosa's, I would love to see a Chelsea bloom! The Hoya curtisii (in your last photo) is one that I've never had any luck with but I read that it requires cooler conditions so I know the heat and humidity is what killed them here. If I ever try Hoya curtisii again, it will stay indoors year round in the air conditioning!

Thank you Lin,

My Hoya curtisii is coming inside right now in the air conditioning,it will hang next to the H.polyneura.I just love talking about my plants because other people will join in and it seems i always learn little tips or really good tips that may just saved a plant.My H. curtisii has never shown much distress besides a few yellow leaves that quickly drop off.

What are some signs that the H. curtisii is in distress from heat & humidity? We have had a heat wave here that's absolutely unreal.High's during the day 107* not taking into consideration the heat index.I don't know how the heat index affects plants but i would image you should say they are in the temp without the heat index and count the humidity separately.I know the higher the humidity the hotter it feels to us.Plants like humidity so how does that work with temps higher than they like and humidity out the roof.

I think I've said this before but i need to look up all my plants (not sure what it's called) temp levels (cool,intermediate & warm)

thanks for the compliment Lin,I have seen pic's of your plants and you have a green thumb,I hope to have someday.



The closest I've come to a Hoya flower!!!

both pic's of the peduncles were taken 5-20-2012 and they still look about the same,that's one reason i put it inside a couple of weeks ago

H. curtisi comes from the Philippines where cool is hard to come by...mine grows outside and blooms often. What curtisii does NOT like is getting dried out. I don't think I would count on ac to help it along...tho it will probably help the polyneura!!! with a lot of light.

Generally I find that hoyas are much happier outside than even in my greenhouse...circulating/moving air is very important....

Carol: I'm so glad you saw this thread! I've learned so much from you about Hoya's the past few years but unfortunately I seem to get brain freeze sometimes and should not have made that statement about curtisii preferring cooler temp's. Geesh, I really don't like perpetrating the spread of incorrect information and that's exactly what I did ... I am so glad you saw this and posted!

Hmm ... Now I'm wondering which Hoya I lost from the heat and humidity. I haven't grown that many Hoya's but for the life of me I can't remember which one I had that I was told it probably succumbed because it was from a cooler region. I used to have a list of information on the my Hoya's but lost it when my computer crashed a few years ago. I'm still bad about remembering to do backups!

Jelinda: Please listen to Carol, she has grown Hoyas for a long time and is extremely knowledgeable and helpful when it comes to these plants! I don't have a greenhouse but I find that my hoya's do much better outside hanging in the trees or sitting on the deck than when they are inside the house. I totally agree that good air circulation is critical, not just for Hoya's ... but for all plants.

Lin - you might have been thinking of H. bella? maybe. That is one, for me, that does not like HOT and sunny. The carnosas (incl. pubicalyx) seem to like cooler and shadier over hot and sunny.

Carol: Thank you ... indeed it was a little bella that I lost from having it out in the heat and humidity! I also lost a polyneura that way.

And, Thank you so much for the reassurance that carnosa's (and pubicalyx) prefer cooler & shadier conditions! I didn't heed that advice but listened to someone else and moved them to a lot of sun. I should have known better! Maybe they can handle full sun in some parts of the world but I've been in Florida a long time and the sun here is way too intense for them to be subjected to for even two hours! My carnosas and pubicalyx all look pretty sad from sunburn. The leaves are faded out and scorched in some places ... but I know they will perk up and look prettier again after they've been back in the shade for awhile! Bright, light but NO direct sun here!

I just went outside to take a couple of pictures. I used to have two of this Hoya carnosa (both were this size) but one was completely scorched and fried from too much sun and didn't survive. This one is slowly recuperating:


This Hoya pubicalyx was sunburned but has almost totally recovered since moving it to a shadier spot:

How's this for WIERD? I think an Anole in my greenhouse is addicted to coronas!!! This is a H. rigida bloom "harvested"...and a large umbel of a carnosa cross is being devoured a bit each day.....

I must admit that is the strangest Hoya bloom i've seen yet!!

I solved the mystery of what was eating my Hoya leaves and roots.It's a HUGE brown cricket,not sure of their names yet but I'm working on it.

Carol: Wow, that is interesting but sad that they are eating the flowers! We have a lot of Anole lizards here and occasionally I see them enjoying Hoya nectar but thank goodness they aren't eating the flowers! A few years ago I got blurry pictures of an anole slurping hoya nectar. I took this picture last week of a little anole heading to a lacunosa bloom but I got too close and scared it away.