Hoya loheri was first collected on Panigtingan, Rizal Province, Luzon Island, Philippines March 15, 1915. It was described by Dale Kloppenburg in 1991 and was named after August loher who did extensive botanical work in the Philippines from 1907-1915 and discovered type specimen. Dale Kloppenburg said that the species “has the most upright columnar corona of any Hoya species in the Acanthostemma Section of Hoya.”

I obtained my first Hoya loheri specimen very early in my Hoya keeping journey, purchasing a small plant in the early 2000s from Carol Noel in Hawaii back when she was actively selling plants. I was a novice grower at the time and lost the plant within six months of receiving it. The plant fell off my radar until I received another in a trade in 2019.

I have to confess that this newly obtained rooted cutting was nothing but trouble from the start. It never grew well, and was started over many times over the ensuing years. It seemed very prone to root rot; it would sit for months literally doing nothing. The leaves were prone to chlorosis, and looked half diseased. I wanted to throw it out so many times over that period. Truthfully I am shocked that I kept it around, and the only reason it stayed with me was that it had never flowered. It was so ugly at times that I actually had to hide it from visitors! I have never had a Hoya that I kept for so long that never so much as put on a peduncle. I went over five years without finding a single peduncle. I should also say that I tried growing this plant in all kinds of different environments including directly outdoors nothing seemed to really make it happy. I wish that I knew what finally made the plant begin to turn around in the last year or so, but for whatever reason it started to at least look acceptable.

In March of this year (2026), I almost fell over from shock when I spotted my first peduncle forming. I almost didn’t believe it. It did not take long after spotting it, before it was growing peduncles all over the plant, and they actually started budding up. I do not have any idea what triggered the blooming response, but it looked promising that after years of trying, I would finally get my flowers! When the buds opened, the blooms took a few hours to fully reflex, and as with almost all of the plants in this section of Hoya the flowers dripped large amounts of nectar.

After I this plant finally flowered I hung it outside for part of the summer, and then discarded it. I don’t get rid of many plants so soon after flowering, but this one was the exception. Having spent so many years looking at what looked like a half diseased plant, I was actually glad to finally be rid of it. This species never liked me or the conditions under which it grew. I can’t really give this one much of a recommendation based on my experiences, but it could behave totally differently in another environment.