Hoyas blooming in July

I have never had so many hoya's in bloom at the same time before. It must be the maritime sun.....lol. My lacunosa is in constant bloom......walking by it at night is so nice since it fills the air with a lilac scent. My carnosa, that had no peduncles when i brought it here, now has at least six peduncles all bearing flowers at some time or another. This one hangs at my back door, and fills the air with a chocolately aroma.


My hoya meliflua (name I received it as) has finally bloomed. It's been a couple years since I received it, and since then it has grown quite nicely. It needs a bit more space than most of my hoya's.....and loves to tangle its four foot vines around almost anything.





A first time bloomer for me is my hoya parviflora.....i expected a bit more from this hoya, thinking the flowers were bigger than what they are. They are smaller than my lacunosa, making it very difficult to photograph. It has a nice floral scent.


My hoya heutchkeliana is also blooming. This is a cute little one with pink urn shaped flowers that smell just like buttered popcorn.

Spring has sprung outside and in my house!

After dissapearing from the blog scene for a while......I am back.  Nothing was really happening in my plant world, and life got pretty busy there for a while.  I moved again into a more permanent house, and my plants love it!  After watching them all do nothing or die for months, it has been nice to see them take off in this new house.  The lighting in this place is close to perfect, its almost like having a sunroom.

Quince Tree

Hoya Carnosa

So here's a few pic's of everything that is starting to bloom.....some in the house, some outside.  Spring in the maritimes is just the most beautifu season I have ever seen.....much different than out West.

This is the first time I have ever seen one of these bugs in my life......needless to say, I stayed in that night.....it died on my steps, and was pretty nasty to wake up to.  I am told it's a June bug......it definetely looks like it crawled up from hell and onto my screen door.  I didnt know what the hell I was looking at when I saw it.....thought I was hallucinating little devil bugs.....lol.

African Violet

Tulips

African Violet

Quince tree flowers

Hoya Carnosa

Hoya Meliflua

My first hoya (compacta).......dead

This was the hoya that started it all........from this hoya grew an obsession. I saw my first hoya flowers on this hoya compacta, and I will never forget the chocolate scent.

I have been having a lot of trouble with many of my plants lately, the past six months has proved to be quite challenging. I have no way of being able to pinpoint the problem, since there are so many factors involved: humidity is different, windows & sunlight are different, the heating of my house has changed (baseboard heaters now.....below each window, plants don't like that too much either), the windows are draftier.....etc. Add on the fact that I have let some of them go pretty dry, possibly too dry.


It could be root rot for all i know, but I am pretty confident that it isn't over watering, since i am a chronic underwaterer. Most of the plants that are dying or have died already, die the same way. Starting from the bottom and working its way down the stems, the leaves die and fall off. The stems go soft until the plant is pretty much dead. BUT.....in the end, the woody part of the plant becomes hollow inside, it doesn't seem to be rotting away. Root rot happens kind of like this, but it's also possible that it went too dry, and the roots are unable to nourish itself.

Luckily I have another hoya compacta, although this one was much nicer.

If anyone knows what is happening to my plants, please let me know......if you have advice, please share it........it's very discouraging watching my plants die.

CopyCat slideshow

Ya, Ya....I am a copycat. I have nothing blooming or really happening, but while blog reading today, I came across this post, and absolutely loved the sideshow, so I had to do my own. Mine is different in the sense that I did a puzzle sort of slide show, so it makes for a bit of a guessing game.

Look for an AV slide show in the days to come too, I just can't resist.

Hoya Compacta Flower from Start to Finish

My compacta just had an umbel of flowers open up, and I actually caught a few pics of the flowers opening. They look so neat when they are in the process of opening, which only lasts a few hours. Even though I have seen this hoya flower a few times, I still love seeing it's flowers and I still love the smell of this one the best (chocolate).

June Blooms

Noid African Violet

Crown of Thorns ( this has bloomed non stop since I got it a year ago,
it is never without some flowers)

Calamondin

Hoya Shepperdi

Hoya Lacunosa

Noid African violet

Aeschynanthus "Black Pagoda"

Hoya Compacta

Hoya Heuschkeliana

Nematanthus aka Goldfish plant

Back Pagoda & More Hoya Flowers & a Peduncle!

I love Spring & Summer so much, except for the bugs. Everything seems to bloom and flower, and there is always something so colorful to find and examine and admire.


To make a long story short (see here & here & here) the above pic is supposed to be an Aeschynanthus "Black Pagoda" hybrid. I am still a little hesitant, but it's still the coolest flower for miles around. It has no scent at all, but it doesn't need it at all, it completely steals the show.


I got a cutting of a hoya polyneura (fishtail hoya) in a recent hoya round robin. It has since rooted really well, and even looks like it might be growing 2 new peduncles!! To some it sounds weird....lol, but to a hoya nut, it's a PeDuNcLe!!! YAY!!


The above hoya lacunosa had some major temper tantrums over the past couple years involving bud blast (see here & here). Now that it has started to flower, it hasn't stopped. It keeps growing new peduncles and more and more are starting to actually make it to bloom. A couple days ago I counted eight open umbels of flowers. The smell still doesn't fill the room like I expected it too, but it is quite strong smelling reminiscent of lilacs. Which reminds me, I have a couple umbels of flowers open on my hoya carnosa; those flowers are very strong either, but those couple can fill my living room at times in the late evening.


This pic is a close up of the hoya lacunosa that is flowering right now. I hadn't realized until a little while ago looking at the pic, that one of the flowers hasn't quite finished opening in the pic, and kind of reminds me of my yellow heuschkeliana flowers.I still can't get a decent close up of these flowers yet.....I have read somewhere that white/light flowers are harder to photograph than others. That's my story and I'm stickin' to it.

Hoya Shepherdii Flowers

The hoya's are on a role on my house. Lately I haven't been without a bloom somewhere. This is my hoya shepherdii blooming away for me. This one has tried to bloom before for me a few times, but also blasted it's buds a few times.


The flowers are so simple. They are white and the inner flower has some purple in it. They are not as strong smelling as some of the other hoya's I have smelled. They smell very light and almost floral-y. It is more of just a fresh smell that I can't quite put my finger on.


This one bloomed for me and I didn't even notice until the flowers were already open. They were sitting back against the wall, kind of hidden by a few other hoya's. When I was watering today I noticed flowers in the back and was happily surprised by these guys.

Hoya Heuschkeliana Flowers & Hoya Ciliata Leafless Cutting update

This is one of the hoya's I got in the DL order. It is the yellow flowered (obviously) hoya heuschkeliana. This is such a cute flower. Pictures definitely make this one look a lot larger than it is in real life. Kudos to the people on the net that have photos of this one. I found it really hard to photograph, and I just don't think my cam can get too much closer. My cam is only 6 months old, and already I need a new one...lol.


This one has the most amazing fragrance to it. It smells like buttered caramel popcorn. I have found that all my hoya's smell way stronger at night. It's a wonderful thing since I work until eleven most nights, so when I get home, all my hoya's smell amazing!


I was checking all my cuttings I received in my DL order and all of them look awesome. I think they are ready to come out of the bag soon. I have opened all the bags to start getting them accustomed to my environment at home. I saw the greatest thing when I was checking them....my hoya ciliata that lost all it's leaves when I got it, has roots. Not only has it rooted, there is a little branch starting to grow. I haven't gotten a pic yet, but I will. There is truth to the notion that leafless cuttings can root. I had read that without the leaves, the cutting would die, but that is not all that
true. This has completely rooted sans leaves, and has new growth in the form of a branch.....in a month or so, it should have a leaf!!