Before I moved my H. obtusifolia from a 14 hour day to a 12 hour day, I lost hundreds of buds. The plant would continually struggle to produce viable buds, but they would yellow and fall off at between 1/8 and 1/4 inch in size. The poor plant wanted desperately to flower, but was simply unable to.
As I have said many times, Hoya obtusifolia will not flower without a period of shortening day length. This can easily be achieved with two different grow areas using lights. I grew mine for a few months at 14 hours of day light and then moved it to 12 hours of day length.
Ordinarily Hoya obtusifolia would be opening her blooms in mid-October, but because of the miracle of being able to change day length with grow lights I bloomed this beauty way back in June.
We have reached the end of October everyone so Happy Halloween everyone! We are now going to spend a few days talking about Hoya obtusifolia as this may have been my most impressive Hoya flowering of 2022.
I had to start my Hoya paulshirleyi seedling over again late summer because of root rot, and it is already flowering again. This is the Hoya that I received with the name Hoya GN-01 that is really a sister seedling to Hoya Paula and for all intents and purposes is that Hoya. It is a winner that is almost continually in bloom!
PES-03 is such a difficult little Hoya to grow well that I always have to celebrate when it comes into flower. Here I have a couple of peduncles full of blooms on a plant that lives in a 3 oz cup. It goes to show you that you do not need a very big pot for this plant, and as a matter of fact small is probably better. Flower comparison photo with Hoya multiflora is also shown.
It appears that over the summer my Hoya cumingiana Seedling was somehow pollinated again so I have a seedpod developing. This is always a rare and exciting moment here in Vermont!
I really love my homemade hanging wire trellises and have dozens of Hoyas in them now. Here is one of my Hoya Bella Seedlings utilizing the trellis from this morning:
It will probably be a long time before I ever flower this one, but it is so cool that I wanted to feature it for a second day. You can see here that I have trained it to climb on a piece of twine secured to the top of my tent.
I struggled with this plant initially when I got it over a year ago, and had to start it over a couple of times before I got it right. It seems to be growing well now, which makes me happy as it has among the most beautiful leaves in the Hoya world.
