I first tried to get this plant from Thailand and because it is one of those thin leaved species that don’t travel well, it was dead on arrival. I was quite surprised when I received a cutting of it in a trade with a collector in North Carolina in the Summer of 2018.
Hoya danumensis is named after the Danum Valley in Sabah, Borneo. Tomorrow I will begin discussing my long road bringing this one into flower.
I chopped up my Hoya griffithii plant over the summer and sold it off. I was left with a couple of tiny cuttings. The smallest of the cuttings has now flowered for the first time.
Hoya sp. Bangkok Red was given to me by Melanie Myers of Tennessee. What ever happened to Melanie, I do not know, but I will always thank her for giving me this wonderful plant. I have owned it now for well over 12 years, and for the first time last spring I chopped it all up and sold it off as cuttings. I kept a couple for myself and started it over; just as I remembered, it was very easy to not only grow, but flowered very early. The flowers also have an amazing scent. Here is my reincarnated plant from this morning:
I absolutely love the foliage on Hoya sp. UT-012 Aff. forbesii and just wish it was easier to grow. I got so tired of restarting this plant that I finally got rid of it. I can only recommend this one for the advanced grower, or intermediate grower who is looking for a challenge.
All I have for background on this Hoya is that it is endemic to Java.
I had a chance recently to sit down for an interview with Maria Failla from Bloom and Grow Radio. She does a wonderful job of putting her interviewees at ease, and I think that my show was very came out pretty well. If you want to give it a listen, the link is here: https://bloomandgrowradio.com/hoya/
I should really call this one not growing as this plant turned out very susceptible to root rot. It would have many stops and starts over time, and became quite frustrating for me after a while. Below the plant at its best:
I got my first peduncle when the plant was about 8-10 months old. It soon budded up an flowered. It was easy to see why this plant is called Aff. forbesii as the flowers are identical to that species, while the leaves are completely different.
After growing this one for a few months I finally got a new leaf on the bare vine, and what a leaf it was! It got these amazing bright pink blotches, which were quite striking. These spots gradually fade with age.
