Very cool, can't wait for mine to be big enough to bloom.

Dee

Very cool, Nancy. This is another one from Iris that I can't wait to grow. How long have you had yours?

Lisa

Congrats on the blooms Nancy!!!! Don't you love those neon orange flowers with the raspberry center???

Of all the hoyas that I grow ,waymaniae probably has the longest peduncle of any that i've seen bloom yet.

What a unique looker! I have 3 leaves of this, and I hope it stays alive and prospers like yours. Congratulations.

Thanks so much!!

Lisa, I've had mine for 2 years this coming Oct.

David, I do love the color...very pretty. Glad to hear from your vast experience that its the longest peduncle you've seen also, I can't imagine any other hoya having longer peduncles than this one,lol...

That's crazy-long! And flowers are sure pretty. Congrats on your first flowers - I look forward to mine blooming now!

Denise in Omaha

This is such a cool Hoya. Congrats on the blooms, good growing!

Mike

That is real neat. I've never seen such a long peduncle before. It that unusual for this one hoya, or can others have the same?

Wow! Fantastic growing, Pug! I could hardly believe my eyes when I saw the topic of this thread. ^_^

I like this plant even more now that I know it has such a crazy peduncle talent. Although I suppose in my world that long peduncle would be just another thing to get caught on the bars of my shelves. v_v

Thank You!!

I think the long peduncle is very common with this hoya...Its definitely the longest one I've ever seen.

So right! I was SO careful every time I water this hoya because I was afraid I was either going to knock it off or snag it and end up ripping it off,lol...

The long peduncle is produced because this plant grows so closely to trunks of trees where they appear camouflaged that the pollinators for this species won't find it. It grows on bare trees in full sun (deciduous?) and all that can be seen are the mottled red leaves colored to protect them from the harsh sun.

I once made a cross of this and Hoya maxima/imbricata. This cross can only be made one way, only one will hold the pollen receptive and won't reverse cross. This is also true when crossing hoya imbricata with hoya caudata. It can be pollinated one way.

It appears that moths are the pollinators for Hoya waymaniae and flies are the pollinators for Hoya imbricata.

Nancy congrats on the gorgeous blooms!! I have a 2 leaf cutting I rooted and so I have a ways to go before mine even thinks of blooming! haha.

RFG I for one am loving the Hoya tidbits your sharing with us. I find it very interesting! Keep em coming!,,,Debbie

Thanks Debbie!! The leaves on this one is really cool too!

Rainforestguy...I have to agree and thank you also for all the great info you've been sharing with us. You sound like you really know Hoyas...where do you grow your hoyas...what zone?

The full sun here in FL during the summer will probably burn all my hoyas to a crisp...so I have to go easy on my direct sun and keep it down to an hour or so in the early morning hurs or even better during the winter here. I've sunburned a little more than I care to admit,lol...

I used to grow hoyas in Hawai'i and while this may seem like an ideal clime for this genus, there were so many cool required species that many won't grow, let alone flower here. Many of the bella group has difficulties here. I love engleriana, and many of the fine linearis, etc. These do grow but are very difficult and rarely flower.
Many other highland cysti's also have a hard time flowering here. While the common paziae, odoratas flower well in warm climes, the highland species do not.
I miss growing the many leafless hoyas and pseudo-hoya species that are all highland requirement species.
But the thick stemmed almost woody trunked species all grow like weeds here. They love the salt air and wait for hurricanes and storms to initiate massed flowers and be receptive for seed making.

I had always pictured Hoya waymaniae as a decumbent grower on fallen logs or horizontal branches. Would you say that this species grows as an ascending climber as well? Many orchid species that are twig epiphytes in scrub or shrubs have these long flower spikes to get the blooms out to where they will be seen by pollinators. I am not sure if Hoya waymaniae grows as a scrambling vine in a similar manner as these orchids either?
Thanks for sharing your knowledge of Hoyas with us.

Mike

Oddly many species of hoyas do produce the long stems of peduncles to get the flower away from the plant itself for various reasons. Many ants have close ties with hoyas, even if they are myrmecophilous or not. They produce nectar from their nodes to attract ants. If a plant produces flowers that are somewhat offensive or strange odor it may also be a deterrent to keep ants away from it to allow pollinators to sip nectar and pollinate the plant. Some ants are pollinators for many small species that produce copious amounts of nectar that drips from the flowers, but usually other animals (like small tree shrews) are the true pollinators.
Hoya waymaniae grows closely to rotten woody branches which also mimic the lichen-moss that covers it. Not sure why it needs to be camouflaged, but many plant species mimics their surrounding vegetation for what ever reasons. Upon seeing this plant in the wild, it is the flower peduncle with the orange, white or yellow flowers that give it away. There are various forms or subspecies of this plant in the wild. Some do not sport the mottled foliage and produce drab white flowers similar to kerrii. Others have very blotchy wild leaves like hoya caudata. But as you well know most collectors just collects one cutting and call it the species name. Unknowingly there are many many varieties of even a single species in the wild that its a shame only one representative to that species is brought to cultivation.
Every plant species in the wild has variations to its form, there is no true black and white sharp definition of a species. Leaves are variable, flowers and even growth habits. The many forms of hoya australis shows us that the same species can be ultra succulent, have huge round leaves, be diminutive, and so on. Yet each is called australis because the flowers and pollinia are exactly the same. You'd be amazed at what people call "new" species that are just replicas of a species already in cultivation. The many forms of a single h finlaysonii are a good example. For the breeder's point of view it's the exact same plant and when pollinating two different finlaysonii forms you get a huge variation because you are simply just pollinating the same species with a wild genetic variability to begin with. Nature makes all kinds of variations to play with their environment. The heart shaped finlaysonii will never make heart shaped leafed babies because it is merely a form of finlaysonii, not a true species.

RFG said..." The heart shaped finlaysonii will never make heart shaped leafed babies because it is merely a form of finlaysonii, not a true species."

Wow...what I would give to see a heart shaped finlaysonii!! Now, that would be pretty cool!

I believe Ted Green calls it Hoya deykeae. It behaves and flowers exactly like a finlaysonii. Hoyas are named because of their floral and pollinia structures NOT by their leaf design.

Ah...Okay, I do have Hoya deykeae. But, I'm really enjoying just growing all the different ones out there.

This is what I mean. Some people give names based of foliage characteristics when they should be done the way it always is done by their floral characteristics.

The first plants I become really interested in were orchid species. Orchids have been collected and studied for a very long time and their taxonomy is much more advanced when compared to Hoyas. It's funny though because the arguments that accompany taxonomic discussions are still bitter after all the years. These same discussions when Hoyas are concerned are just as bitter even though in comparison they are still in their infancy, lots of work to still be done.
It's very true that leaf morphology is not used as a sole method of plant identification. A plant can radically change to adapt to it's environment and genetic variability always comes into play. I think many collectors of Hoyas don't understand that the plants we grow and share are all just clones of original collections because they were vegetativly propagated. We have this pop up quite often with Hoya carnosa and often times people think they have another species just because it does not look exactly like the Hoya carnosa they are most familiar with. All natural populations have a range of differences seen in each species, different flower colours, sizes and leaf shapes and sizes dependent on genetic or environmental conditions. It also holds true that collectors of plants are interested in specific characteristics like colour saturation and flower size, they want the best quality over quantity so you end up with less variation in collections overall. David and Iris Marie Liddle's collection shows a large selection of Hoya pottsii plants because they were the most accessible seeing as collecting them meant traveling within Australia. Still most collectors would only be interested in having a few of these plants because they don't often have the space to commit to a large number of a single species. It would be nice to see more collections made of our favorite species and I think most of us gravitate towards the Thai growers because they often have new collections available.
When it comes down to it a plant can be named for any characteristic it has which could include flower, leaf or any other part of the plant. Hoya parvifolia is an example of a Hoya named for it's small leaves, pubicalyx being named for the downy/hairy calyx. Having said that species can not be differentiated on a single characteristic and flower parts (not colour) are the main way of differentiating between species.
We do have a problem when we receive plants with names that might not be correct. Take the Hoya incrassata, crassicaulis and macgregorii mix up for example. If you grow both Hoya incrassata and crassicaulis you may not really have two different species but rather one with the other being improperly identified. The problem starts when you change the name and then trade plants and loose track of who's collection that plant originated in. If a misidentified plant is ever properly identified by a trained botanist and we know it's accession number (IML or GPS etc.) then that plant can be traced and the problem fixed. If those plants have their name changed by hobby growers then a whole new problem arises and it cannot be so easily fixed. I think it's always best to record where your plants are from and any collection or catalog data and if you are skeptical of the ID then make a note on the plant tag or in your records.
With orchids it is always the conflict between the lumpers or the splitters who want to either keep a genus intact or break it down further into parts. Sometimes you get a completely new genus and then everyone has to learn all the new names and change the hybrid names and it is so complicated that each year a massive registry is published just so that orchid judges can keep it all straight. This does become a pain but it can also be looked at as progress in the field of plant taxonomy and this should be the realm of taxonomists and botanists and not hobby growers.
When you look at Hoyas it seems like it should be so simple, I mean this is only one genus we are talking about and not the entire plant family (like orchids). Still seeing new species published each fall in Fraterna along with often very poor photographs and lacking the full Latin publication that makes the new species valid adds more fuel to the fire. Still I think this is for trained botanists and taxonomists to worry about. Most collectors want to have properly identified plants and following along with new publications and plant name changes/updates is just part of that. I think many collectors and especially hobby growers find the disagreements that abound concerning naming Hoyas (plants) to be something they would like to simply avoid.

A quick question about Hoya deykeae. I am unaware of the complete history of this plant other than the publisher (T. Green) but I am now wondering if this was a single collection from only one site? Are there multiple collections from different sites that could be used in breeding or essentially just one original specimen?
Are you saying that if you self Hoya deykeae you get a range of leaf shapes that could be expected for Hoya finlaysonii?
One thing that is interesting is floral scents. Hoya deykeae has a different floral scent than finlaysonii. Obviously floral scents are not used to identify plants but they are part of the whole picture.

Mike

/RFG.

Love the explanation about the long peduncles. This is an adaptation that I've always found very appealing and I confess I never got around to investigating its catalyst.

I also wondered why some species camouflage themselves.

It is a pleasure having you contributing to the forum. Although I need to quit staying up till 3AM catching up on your posts.

/Mike.

Thanks for clarifying between naming a species and differentiating among species.

I was just thinking it would be nice to have a Big List of Commonly Misidentified Hoyas, but I guess the trends in misidentification change so much over the years that what was a relevant warning 10 years ago might just lead to unnecessary confusion now. Personally, I enjoy the never-ending argument over names an interesting soap opera to tune into, but I often feel like I need to keep a notebook just to keep track of all the tangentially referenced leads.

I wouldn't have thought about the scent, but that is interesting.

Ted has named many many hoyas with wrong (complete idiot) names. The way hoyas are named and identified is by floral characteristics and pollinia shape (almost exclusively), whether it has small leaves or red leaves, a plant can be named for their foliage, fruits, or what ever but it's their floral characteristics that make them unique. The leaves are not the whole description for the species.
People use leaf descriptions to name a plant and that's fine so long as the floral characteristics are unique and different from anything that has been described prior.
Hoya deykeae, H. callistophylla, viteeliniodes, finlaysonii are all the same species. Hoya meredithii is not Hoya vitellina (as it was once called) and is totally different from the finlaysonii group. But interestingly it is closer to incrassata than any other species.

The hoya archboldiana-macgillivrayi-onuchoides group is another interesting group and may some day be considered all the same single species, just variations even florally of it. You can get an archboldiana from a macgillivrayi and vice a verse. I have had archboldiana cupped flowers come from crosses using two different forms of macgillivrayi and everyone accusing me of mixing up the seeds in the trays when the seedlings flowers.

More interestingly is the eriostemmas where yellow, pink, red and brown colored flowers do come from self pollinated plants all from a selfed red flowered plant. Makes you wonder if these colored forms are all the same species.