Brad Hoya kerrii is designed to endure pretty harsh conditions. This is obvious when you know what to look for, thick succulent leaves and a thick stem help this plant survive the dry season. Species with these adaptations like to dry out and often times they endure much more intense sun than other more delicate Hoya species. If you baby this Hoya with shade and too much water you will get an unruly vine, give it really bright light and let it dry out and growth will be more compact. In the heat of the summer you can water more often but winter should be dryer but still bright.
I got my plant from a friend who grows hers in the shade, it climbs everything and she has to cut it back often to keep it in check. My plant is in very bright light all year and it is slow and steady with much more manageable growth.
I don't think this is a difficult Hoya at all but it is much better behaved if you grow it a little hard.

Mike

I grow the variegated form in my office and it does seem to want to be an unruly vine. I just keep wrapping it against a trellis to manage it. I love it. It is very undemanding and the leaves are spectacular. When I had it on my sunny porch it had very drippy blooms, but it hasn't bloomed in the 8 months I've had it at work.

Thanks Mike and Odyssey! Hmm...sounds like it's growth habit is similar to carnosa, which is a very big advantage :). I'm wondering if I grow it the way you said Mike, if I could grow it as a hanging plant?

Brad AKA Moonwolf

No Brad, sorry, not a candidate for hanging basket (IMO). It's just too darn heavy.

The way to do it seems to be w/trellises or hoops; got to bend or hoop the branches while they're younger & still somewhat pliable.

Currently, I've got 2 very separate green Kerrii's (1 in mix & 1 in plain water). They're not easily contained plants, they seem to want room. I currently have a tri-lobed leaf on one which pix I hope to share soon.

I've got 2 variegated Kerriis which often have weird & strange growth, sometimes aborted leaves.

The white margined variegated Kerrii seems to put most of its energy into leaves closely spaced together rather than the long vines the solid green like to grow. I believe it was Denise who recently shared this observation & my experience was exactly the same.

If you've got the space, do it, if you've got your heart set on a hanging basket, I'd suggest this is the wrong type of Hoya, try maybe a Pubicalyx or one of the Carnosas.

Thanks, PG! Hmm, maybe I'll put my Red Buttons or Black Dragon (finally starting to grow new leaves) in a hanger. Of course, that's not until fall, so why worry now lol.

Brad AKA Moonwolf

Kerri hoya is in my wish list, MIKE how fortunate you are to have a friend that has to do kleeping often on her kerry, I imagine that she does not sent over sea.

Brad if you are set on a hanging basket you could use on with extra long wire hangers and then just train kerrii to wrap around and climb up them. This is a really stiff plant and if you let it hang without support it would become difficult to deal with unless you have quite a bit of space to let it grow.

Urraca Hoya kerrii is a very popular species so it's not very hard to find. What country are you in as I am sure we can recommend a source for a cutting.

Mike

You can use those circular trellis deals that you can buy at Lowe's or HD for Kerri and wrap the vine around which looks really neat.

Susan

Hi Susan,

Don't know if you've tried this yourself (what you're recommending), but Kerrii's not too easy to train or wrap 'cause (1) the stems are very thick (thickness of pencil); (2) the stems harden & become much less flexible w/ age.

From personal experience, it's near impossible to wrap this circularly, I've tried.

Yes, I did. I don't happen to have that plant now but it worked fine for me. It looked great. I did this after it had grown a long vine. Maybe that was the difference.

Susan

Hello MIKE, I'm from Spain a long way from Ontario where I happened to live for a long time, and hoping to return some day. Thanks.

Hi Susan, your circular trellis from Lowe's/HD sounds like something I'd love to find. Was it sold in the garden center? I don't believe I've ever seen them in my local stores? You wouldn't have a picture of the trellis would you? Thanks!

I believe that I've seen them out in the garden center hanging with garden supplies. But I'm sure you can order them online probably in different sizes. Try Google.

Urraca try Paul Shirley Succulents because I think he ships across most of Euroupe.

Mike

My standard kerrii is utterly untrainable. The stems get thick and stiff very quickly. I grow it on a top shelf in my GH, so it gets lots of light, yet there's quite a distance between leaf nodes. It takes up a LOT of room. However, you may have read in a previous post that I find both the veined clone and hairy kerrii are much more compact. I recall that the original poster said they got what I thought was a veined clone from Gardino's, so I'd get that one if I were you.

And yes, kerrii is absolutely worth adding to your collection. Just put something under it (like newspaper) if it decides to bloom indoors.

Denise in Omaha

I just repotted my diversifolia last night and I was thinking of this thread, of course, because I have no idea what to do with it when it reaches the top of its hoop. Bigger hoop? Chopchop?

It looks surprisingly beautiful atm, but, idk... Maybe it's possible to bend it over the top and then down at a slight angle, so it's kind of growing sideways until it's ready to be strapped down and turned upward again.

I don't have kerrii, so I can't compare, but they're about the same in this respect, right? Long internodes and thick hard vines?

Wow! LOTS of positives about kerrii! lol Denise, you're such an enabler! Hmm, guess I'll have to wander over to Gardino's to see what they have in stock.

GG, great to hear about the diversifolia :) . Sounds like it's growing you out of house and home lol. Your idea sounds fine to me!

Brad AKA Moonwolf

You have no idea, Brad. I gave a cutting of it to my grandmother (What was I thinking?! I should have given her a lacunosa or something... I think it was just handy as I was running out the door.) and she and my aunt look at it like they're afraid it's going to eat them. It's kind of galloping over the violets.

I had all the cuttings you'd sent in a bunch of different pots, but I consolidated it. I'll take a picture for you this weekend. I still have two pots of it, plus 6 starts I'm using for my light/dark Kukka experiment.

Good luck finding a good kerrii!

LOL! That's not a hoya, that's Audrey Two!!!! Oh cool! I can't wait to see them! What is the light/dark Kukka experiment? Sounds neat! BTW, Kukka sounds like a character out of a video game we would play :) . Funny thing is, if I did get kerrii, I would name it Venus. Need I say more?

Brad AKA Moonwolf

As promised! The Hoya diversifolia from my trade w/Brad a little overexposed from the strong western light this time of day. ^_^

This second shot is to emphasize the nice diversification of leaves it is producing. From super long and skinny to ovular and heavily spotted to strange wavy ones. The variegation is so strong on some leaves they look almost marbled, while others are pure green.

It's about halfway up its hoop now, but it grows fast and the vines are pencil thickness, as described of the kerrii, so I hope no one minded me lumping it in with the issues discussed in this thread.

GG, I have both diversifolia and kerrii, and trust me - kerrii's vines are much thicker AND stiffer! I kind of feel like diversifolia can be trained (I'm not a good trainer...) because they start out pretty pliable, but kerrii's vines are stiffish right from the start and then get downright hard. But I have a feeling diversifolia is going to become quite a monster, too. I've got two of them - one I started as a cutting from PG, the other I got from Gardino's as just "sp." I'm still waiting on flowers, though, even though the oldest if 5 years old!

Denise in Omaha

/Brad The dark light experiment is a replication study I am running, based on that which was described by a member here by the name of Kukka. She translated for us an experiment posted on a Finnish forum, in which they found that plants rooted faster in dark than in light.

It took me a while to get around to starting my trial, but as promised, it has begun. The conditions are:

Subject: Hoya diversifolia

cell 1: soil, light
cell 2: willow water, light
cell 3: water, light
cell 4: soil, dark
cell 5: willow water, dark
cell 6: water, dark

Obviously, we won't be able to compare the soil cells to the other cells until the very end, but I still wanted to know how they compared.

Kukka said her handle means flower in Finnish. Pretty, huh? I think Venus sounds like a great name for kerrii.

/Denise I am SO GLAD to hear that diversifolia is comparably manageable! That gives me a lot of faith that, with forethought, I can handle what I've taken on. I would like to have a kerrii someday, but I'm definitely going to take your advice on the compact varieties when I do!

I'd heard this was a stupid one about blooms, so I just set it off in a corner by itself and let it please itself. Its tolerance of my shortcomings helps me tolerate its shortcomings, I guess. ^_~

Here is a link that might be useful: Kukka's post: dark/light trial

Wow! The diversifolia is really stunning! ^_^ Let us know how the experiment turns out! I do like that name. I want to call my kerrii Venus because she is the goddess of love and beauty for one thing and another thing was that Sailor Venus uses a chain of hearts as one way to fight the bad guys! (Ok I'll say it: my name is Brad and I'm a nerd).

Brad AKA Moonwolf

I have very unhappy experience with Kerrii, both green and variegated: they don't bloom!
I have them in the sun, in the shade, in pot, climbing on trees... everywhere, still no blooms :-( The variegated one doesn't even grow a leaf!
What should I do???

Xuan

I managed to train my kerrii onto a trellis, but I don't really recommend the method... I didn't water it for a looong time, so it got pretty pliable. I took the opportunity to carefully bend it into more of a S shape on the trellis. I needed to take the height down without trimming the growing tip, so that worked out great for me.

Even then, it bled a little sap. I thought about putting this one outside for the summer but I guess it's good I did not. There appears to be grasshoppers/locusts (whichever they are) eating anything green in sight. I don't know that they'd make much headway with kerrii's tough leaves, but even a hole or two or nibbles would irritate me, as it doesn't have much in the way of leaves to begin with. It has a vine approaching 3 ft long though!

I'm glad you posted that, Quinn, because I'd been thinking the same thing about withholding water for a long time first. I am not very talented at this kind of thing, as witnessed every time I have to wrap the stems of my Gesneriads around their rootballs lol. Either I don't dehydrate them enough or I am just not practiced enough yet. I snapped another Kohleria stem last night. -_-

That said, I'd like to see that S shape!