While this plant can never be called floriferous, it finally did flower a fair amount for me in my grow tent in 2020. This is a Hoya that has never lived in my regular house so I can’t speak for how well it would do a a houseplant. It grew in my regular chunky potting mix, and was completely unproblematic.
Finally after years of trying I got my first flowers on the plant. While they were not that impressive, the scent was magical, and I was very glad to get this one behind me!
Finally in 2018 I saw my first peduncle, but it took forever to finally bud up and when it did of course the buds blasted. Finally in the spring of 2019 Buds began to form on one of many peduncles. There were not many, but I was excited none the less.
Hoya persicina rooted very quickly and grew well right out of the box, but year after year went by with no peduncles. It looked like this was going to be one of those really shy bloomers.
Hoya persicina came to me as a trade from my friend Patrick Vance, a renown U.S. Hoya collector. I received it as a cutting in 2014, and it took quite a while to flower it.
Ted Green’s Hoya archboldiana YM Excellent is really quite excellent even though the name was made up and is really the original Hoya archboldiana. I brought this one up out of the tent to enjoy for 10 days, or so while it was in flower. I have to say that the scent was outstanding, and it was great having it upstairs in the living space.
We ended the month with Hoya inflata and now we are going to begin another with the plant. Mostly because I have suffered with it for so long, I’m going to make the most of it. The plant really is a bear to grow; just remember: warm, humid, good light, but most of all don’t over water – keep it very dry.
Hoya inflata is a plant that I had pretty much given up on growing, as I had struggled mightily with it over the past 4 years. I finally seem to have it under control though. Here is what you need to do if you want to grow it like me. Use semi-hydro, but keep it very dry; only water when it is completely dry and then only give it a sip. Growing it this way has finally gotten the thing to actually start looking like a plant again. Here is a set of blooms from this week:
I never could really understand why this one came with this particular name, as there are no black leaves at all. I rather think that it is just another in a long line of parasitica/verticulata/acuta clones. It does not really matter as it is a fine looking plant.
This plant has spent many months on the windowsill and has not done much of anything, but it just managed to flower. The flowers are highly perfumed!
