I received a cutting of this Hoya in the summer of 2019 from Jimmy Myers in North Carolina. I had been struggling with Hoya onychoides New (AH-307) for sometime having had to start it over an number of times. So I was kind of ambivalent about this one, but I planted it in soil and it rooted up. It grew okay for awhile, but then as was happening to so many of my plants in that period, the roots rotted.
After the roots were gone, I took a strong cutting and rooted it in leca and put the plant in a semi-hydro pot. At the time I was converting many of my plants to leca thinking this was going to be the answer to some of my rot problems – trust me that it was not the answer! This plant grew strongly for a while through out most of 2020 and then stalled out in the latter half of the winter. The biggest problem with growing in leca using a reservoir is that if you don’t flush regularly with clear tap water you will quickly get rot, and that is what caused the plant to stall out.
It began to come around from some of its root rot problems late in the summer of 2021. It started to put on new growth and a few healthy roots. In September it put on a peduncle and when it was move back inside for the year under a new LED plant light, buds began to develop and it flowered around Halloween.
This plant originally came from AH Hoya in Thailand and her numbering system seems to leave something to be desired. They are not real accession numbers and they seem to change regularly depending on how they move up or down on her price list. My Hoya onychoides New (AH-307) seems to no longer be available, and this one that was on the list as Hoya onychoides New (AH-455) now seems to be numbered 441 as of this writing. So the numbers are somewhat worthless. I know that my #307 and #455 are not the same plant, as #455 is more vigorous and has larger leaves than #307. They are, or more correctly were, both labeled as “New.” So what does that mean? I have no idea. The numbers move up or down every year depending on what she is offering making it hard to know what you are purchasing.
If you can find this clone, I highly recommend that you pick it up, but finding it could be a bit problematic as who knows which “New” onychoides you will be picking up. You can’t necessarily go by the number as was explained by me previously. All of the “New” onychoides have spectacular flowers, but leaf size and vigor seems to be different among the clones.
