The buds now reached a size where I no longer feared that they would blast and I would sometimes open the tent 3 times a day just to check their progress!

I have been growing a plant seriously for more than 3 years using every trick at my command trying to get it to flower; the plants name was Hoya desvoeuxensis. I finally had it growing in 3 different mediums and moved it from a 14 hour day to a 12 hour day and let it climb to the ceiling in my grow tent. It started to bud up, and I lost my first set of buds, but then a miracle happened and two different plants began to bud up; I was beyond happy; I was finally going to flower this pink, bell-shaped beauty!

Hoya apoda has probably been my favorite Hoya discovery of 2022. It flowers profusely with up to 8 flowers open at any one time. It seems to continually put out new buds and appears to be a relatively easy grower. This plant turned out to be much better than Hoya exilis, which seems to be at least at first glance kind of boring. Hoya apoda for now seems to be most readily available from Indonesian vendors, but hopefully in the near future many more sellers will feature it closer to home. Hoya apoda gets my highest recommendation!

At the time of Hoya apoda’s discovery in 1912, the western part of the Island of New Guinea was controlled by the Netherlands. It was discovered by C. Boden Kloss, an English zoologist and intrepid explorer. The plant was published by Spencer Le Marchant Moore, and English botanist who died in 1931.

Apoda in the animal world means limbless or not having limbs and in the botanical world, it means stalkless. I believe it is referring to this Hoya not having visible peduncles, which makes apoda a very apt name indeed.

Below you can see the size of the flowers again a measuring tape:

Finally on the morning of May 19, 2022 my first flower opened up. There was no real scent and the smallest amount of nectar on the corona.

The strange thing about this plant was there was no discernable peduncles; it was as if the pedicel came directly out of the leaf node. After looking Hoya exilis up online and checking photos, I knew that this was not that Hoya, but what was it? I immediately put in an email to Julie Kennedy who has been so helpful to me throughout my Hoya growing career. She took my information and went to all of her sources. Finally we got the answer from Miros and Susanne; the plant now had a name: Hoya apoda. Below the large bud of H. apoda:

After switching the plant over to tree fern, the plant immediately began to do better and grew quite well. After growing it for some time with 14 hours of day light without getting a peduncle, I decided to switch it over to a 12 hour day. It was not much longer before I had my first peduncle only 10 months after receiving the plant, but wait…

Hoya apoda came to me as a small rooted plant with the name of Hoya exilis from a wonderful grower in Phoenix. We exchanged Hoyas in trade, and I was happy to get a new plant to try, and one that I had not heard of. It came growing in Pon, and for those who are not familiar with it, the substrate looks like fine aquarium gravel. I grew it that way for about 3 months, before I switched it over to tree fern. Below the foliage of the plant I received.