Hoya meliflua is my Ruby Today!

I am looking for any structure for Ruby Tuesday. But my files are all mostly full of my hoyas! I cannot search in my other external drive as i normally leave that old one at home. So a newly photographed Hoya meliflua is handy for this meme. I hope you will enjoy this as not many garden bloggers are familiar with hoyas.

 Hoya meliflua is native to the Philippines, a prolific bloomer and not really very difficult to grow. It normally flowers during our hot dry season, which enduce it to produce lots of umbels. This is the 3rd year that my plant is blooming.

The red color is actually the stain of the nectar flowing on the velvety corolla. Upon opening the color is a bit pale, but immediately produce the red color a few hours after as nectar production is immediate. Of course, insects love sipping the nectar too. The above bee cannot easily leave because of the lure of the nectar. 

I stayed a few minutes taking a lot of shots of the bee. I am not disappointed in my purpose, as i am trying to find an insect with hoya pollinarium carried by their feet. This bee accidentally got the pollinarium because its feet has small hooks that stepped on the spot where the pollinaria are located. There are always 2 pollinaria in one socket, and this bee got one. If ever it injected the pollinarium to the stigma of another flower, cross pollination happens and will produce a natural hybrid. That is a wonderful outcome for a hoya grower if that happens. I hope this bee alights on more flowers of another species, to possibly pollinate them. Oh how i wish, i will say a few prayers! LOL.

Ruby Tuesday Too

Our World Tuesday
Outdoor Wednesday
Image-in-ing
Floral Friday Fotos