Flower In Focus

I have not revived the Hoya In Focus for sometime. Actually i don't have a time schedule for it, just do it when i feel like so, or when i am inclined to post one again. Usually, i do a species if i have many photos of the plant and flowers, at least with several stages of flower development.

Now i have Hoya benguetensis. This means it came from Benguet, a province in the Cordillera Region in the highlands. Baguio City is maybe the more famous place, and it is from Benguet province. The suffix "ensis" means the species originated from that place.

My first idea is that this plant needs a colder temperature, as it is cold in Benguet being in the highlands. So i placed this plant first under some shades of other plants to at least have a slightly lower temperature. However it didn't flower for two years. It just produced leaves. Above shows the lovely green leaves, with 4 veins attached to the midrib, called quintuplinerve. (I will still verify if my memory is correct)

Then i placed it in the north part of the garden where it received direct sunlight from morning till afternoon. It immediately produced peduncles that eventually turned into lovely red umbels. This plant has 4 umbels that never stopped blooming. After dehiscence, new buds again start to develop. 

The stems are not very much twining, unlike other hoyas. The young shoots just grow in the space nearby without holding on to other stems, resulting in dangling long stems falling to the sides.  From these stems arise the peduncles that bear the buds. 

These are the buds from the topmost photo. Compared to other hoya buds, these are more flattened, with just a very slight protrusion at the tip or center of the bud, which later on becomes the tip of the corolla. 

This shows the slightly opening flowers, which happen at the early afternoon about 2:00pm. I just am not sure if this time is the same in all places. A very prominent distinguishing feature of this species is the dark corona, maroon or fuchsia, with yellow at their centers. 

A very lovely shape of the flowers immediately after all the buds opened. This happens just a few minutes from the start of corolla break. 

A few hours later the flowers reflex to this positions. This was already shot about 6:00pm or 4 hours from start of opening. For most hoyas, the strongest scent was emitted after full opening, together with production of nectar. It signals that they are ready for pollination, attracting the night pollinators like the moths. However, even the ants, spiders, praying mantis, some green fly and other insects are attracted too. In this case, those small black ants partake in the sweet nectar. 

This shows the reflexed corolla of Hoya benguetensis flowers, with the corolla tips even bending backwards.  Am sorry for the blurry photo, but this is what i can find in my files, haven't taken a nicer single flower photo. 

Floral Friday Fotos
Flower Friday
Today's Flowers

In Focus: Hoya madulidii

Hoya madulidii is the 3rd hoya discussed here at In Focus. The first is Hoya siariae and 2nd is Hoya obscura, all endemic to the Philippines. H. madulidii is named after the botany head of our National Museum, an author of many books on plants, Dr. Domingo A. Madulid. It is formerly known as Hoya ciliata but the synonymy is not yet resolved. According to Burton, C., PS The Hoyan, Vol 9 #4, the correct name is Hoya ciliata as it was the previously published name. There is also a name called Eriostemma madulidii, but nobody is resolving the complications yet. The more commonly used name however, is Hoya madulidii.  

My plant has been with me for 3 years before it ultimately flowered. I have 3 plants and the 2 simultaneously bloomed this dry season. I read that it likes sunlight so i placed it in an open area with direct sun from noon to sunset, in the morning it is partially shaded by other hoyas. The media is also very porous that water thoroughly drain at once. Temperatures with range of 30 to 36°C this year from January to May was favorable for it, i suppose.

My flowers were favorably colored black, but eventually turn lighter as the flowers age. They remain open for about 2 weeks, then wilted. Other plants i saw in the net are of different lighter color variations.

These are the already wilted flowers, which curled backwards mostly on the tips. Color lightens too. The flowers are bigger than many of the hoyas endemic here in the country.  Oh i do not think it has a scent common with other hoyas.

about to open buds

 Each flower at different stages of maturity grows from a common stem,  unlike most hoyas that emerge to be an umbel in a common peduncle. It has a milky white sap that is very sticky and crumbles when dried.

The leaves of H madulidii are very pubescent or hirsute with the edges curling backwards. An authority told me that the curling is the obvious difference between Hoya ciliata, whole leaves remain flat. The vines continue to grow long and drooping to maturity before flowering. Maybe they droop because i continue to remove the upward twining vines, forced them to make a loop and hang. 

The very young shoot and leaf of Hoya madulidii showing the lovely pubescence. It could probably endure direct sunlight because of this hairy leaf surfaces. 

Floral Friday Fotos

Today's Flowers

Macro Monday 2

Transient Sky Garden

Most of you who follow my blogposts are familiar with my sunset views, direct from my west window.  They are most lovely during our dry season, as the skies are clear, and the clouds just sometimes provide dramatic backdrop to the one single prominent structure in my horizon, the Iglesia ni Kristo church. In the big city where i stay most of the weekdays and only a few weekends of the year, i live in a condominium unit at the 5th Floor Window. That is the reason most of my sunset labels are 5th Flr Window.

When you are a gardener living at the 5th Floor, there is no way you can have a space for a garden. Besides, it is not allowed for us to hang anything out of the window or the common areas. Even at the 8th floor which is used for hanging laundry, other things not used for laundry are banned. Being as hard headed as I admit to be, i put a small snake plant in my laundry hanger cubicle, the only plant seen in that area.

 Lo and behold, i have plants outside the 5th Floor window. It faces west so the guards are not asking me to throw my plants, I keep them there and they are not complaining. It has been bare this dry season, nothing can withstand the heat from the sun plus generated heat by the cement wall. So i uprooted the bulbs from the province and brought some here for flower forcing. I used empty bottles with mouths just fitting the bulbs, put them there at the height of the dry season, 1 May-Labor Day.

 I have 2 species, and the above shows them with the first shooting up scapes. Left is white and at right is the pinkish Hippeastrum roseum. Other bulbs are not yet sending up the scapes.

 The white is NOID, i forgot where i got it from. H roseum is from Malaysia, from an exchange.

 It was already like this third week from planting, 21 May. By the way, when the scape is already up, i put it inside the closed window in the morning before i leave for the office, as it might topple down when i am not home. That was just to assure its presence when i return at night.

 I purposely did not go home this weekend to watch them bloom fully, and of course to take their photos. It is the first bloom of the white so i have to watch it clearly, and document it.

 I appreciate the 2 flowers blooming at almost the same time, forming a cross. Hmmm, i envision a cross super-imposed to the distant church.

 The anthers open to the golden pollen on the second day from opening of the petals.

Are you not curious why this shot is devoid of the anthers and pollen grains? I actually emasculated this flower, saved the pollen in the refrigerator hoping to pollinate the H roseum that is not yet open at the moment. I hope the above stigma will be able to stay longer for the pollen of the nearby H roseum. I want to play with them, and i will also save some pollen for the H puniceum that are still dormant at home. 

So this is my final post, its background is the already cloudy sky signally the not so far rainy season. And the blurred horizon is the structure of the church, my flowers tower among them, so i am satisfied, in fact delighted. 

Our World Tuesday

Outdoor Wednesday

Through My Lens

Floral Friday Fotos

Today's Flowers

Very Early Hoya Bloomers

I started growing hoya in 2010, so that was more than 5 years ago. Those first 2 plants dwindled for almost a year, without my attention. However, they didn't die even with neglect. One is planted on a driftwood vacated by orchids, in full direct sun that made the leaves truly yellow, wilted and most leaves die during the dry season. When the rains come it resurrected and continue adding leaves and stems. The second one was planted on a foot-long dried branch. Despite the dry and pathetic condition, it flowered once even with just a few inches of stem.

That triggered my addiction to hoyas and i continued adding more species as time went by. Now, my weekend at home in the province for 2 days and 1 night always seem very short,  time fully devoted to them and yet i want more. It truly is addictive and contagious, so whenever someone starts having it, that was my warning.

The following are some species which responded so fast to life that upon stabilizing as a newly rooted plant, it began producing buds and flowers. This is special, as most plants grow for years before producing buds. Patience is the topmost requirement in growing them. So i feel like giving tribute to the few exceptions here!

Hoya scortechinii (still with the label from the seller in Thailand, even wrongly written there). It came as a cutting which i rooted and planted in December in this recycled cup. After 4 months it struggled to produce those 4 buds, but it is looking great.

close-up  of Hoya scortechinii buds

H scortechinii flowers, already completely reflexed corolla

Another young newly planted cutting that immediately produced a big umbel is this red Hoya lacunosa. This is already a cutting from my mature plant.

The fully open flowers of red Hoya lacunosa looks like they are from a mature plant. The cutting has 2 nodes with 4 leaves, and they are enough to fully sustain those 14 lovely flowers.

This is a bit older plant than the previous 2, because it already has a long stem typical of the first new long growth. However, those 2 buds are still early for the typical plant. My previous plants of this Hoya crassicaulis were already bigger when they produced the first bloom. 

bloom of Hoya crassicaulis

You will be delighted with this Hoya obscura young plant. It was very newly planted and just starting to stabilize. It immediately produced those buds despite the position of the pedicel, because the normal position of the umbel is drooping down. Even then, the position didn't deter it to produce lots of buds. 

In effect this look is not typical of the normal Hoya obscura umbel. 

This young plant is also still very young with only 2 leaves from the 2 nodes, yet it already has an umbel with lots of buds. You can still see the blurred top of the planter. I am sorry i forgot which plant this is. I wasn't able to see also the flower when it bloomed during the weekdays i am not home. 

Our World Tuesday

Outdoor Wednesday

Floral Friday Fotos

Today's Flowers

Hoya imperialis

Hoya imperialis is a bit difficult for me to know well. It has been with me for almost 2 years and yet i still cannot understand what it fully wants to perform fully. I am aware that it hasn't received its full needs, there are three umbels that always start with many buds. Many of the buds abort at different stages of growth. But at least there still are a few flowers that continue to open. I guess it doesn't  like water more than it needs, at the same time it doesn't want to experience even a short dryness at all. In other words, it is difficult, just difficult.

But when it opens, even just only a flower will get your heart, and it really is awesome! Moreover, it stays there for 8 days. My sister says it looks so mysterious, to the brink of a bit scary at night because it is different-looking among most of the hoyas. The diameter is around 2 inches without stretching those corollas. For me, it just is other-worldly!

Macro Monday 2

Today's Flowers

Ruby Tuesday Too

Floral Friday Fotos

Hot & Heat Resistant Plants for May GBBD (republished from May last year)

The plants i posted for April  I called heat tolerant. But some of them already died this May, leaving a few that are really very persistent in living. I don't know how to describe them, i guess they are really resistant to extended hot temperatures. But some of them just bloom this May, which is also unusual for me.

Sanchezia speciosa is a perennial in our climate. I just prune them immediately after the dry season or when rainy season begins. This clump we had has been with us for already 7 years, and still going nicely. If the old plants are not cut to give way to new shoots, insects like aphids and mealy bugs get in, so i would rather start them new.                                                                                                                                                

Our Hippeastrum puniceum, as i've posted in an earlier post, lost all their leaves since March. We expect them to bloom after the first heavy rains in May, however due to unknown circumstances some of them flowered at the height of the dry season. Reasons are still not known, but maybe dormancy was cut by any factor aside from water.
                                                                                                                                                                 

 Rain or without rain, its beauty is the same, sizes are the same too, however they fade/dehisce faster with the heat. Morever, the beauty of simultaneous blooming within a hedge is not reached because not all of them flowered without water.            

                                                                                                                                                                   

  This is Crinum Ellen Bosanquet, a temperate climate lily given to me from the US. It struggled to grow, but persistence let it bloom for the first time. However, compared to those growing in their natural habitat, the scape is just above 1 foot. Fortunately, the sweet scent is in the genes, so we savored its lovely aroma in the evenings.                                                                                                                                                  

The same crinum with a trumpet-like flower before it fully opens.                                                                

                                                       The red salvia is looking great as well.                                                                                                                                                                                           

Euphorbia millii, being a succulent is quite happy, rather than affected by heat.   It never stops flowering.                
                                                                                                                                                                 

This white petunia is the only bloom we have that is not only orange or red. It just behaves nicely because it is under the shade of the hoya plants, provided with two layers of black net.                                                                                                                                                                                                                  

This red Pentas lanceolata is moderately resistant to heat, so i placed its pot also under the hoya area.

                                                                                                                                                                   

This plant i forgot the name,but this might be a species of the shrimp plants.                                                                          

The plants occupying my almost full attention during weekends that i am home are my hoyas. Most of them are flowering for the first time. At the left is Hoya obscura, while at the right is Hoya fungii. Whenever a new peduncle is growing, i am always on guard asking my sister and nephew the stage of development. The digital technology is very useful for remote control or absentee gardeners. When they texted me that one peduncle already opened, or one is about to open, i will surely go home to observe, watch and take photographs. I gothere after waking up, camera on hand, and stay there as long as i can still withstand the heat. At a distance in our terrace, my eyes and attention are still focused on them.                                      
                                                                                 

This is the close-up of Hoya fungii. It gave simultaneous blooms for three umbels. The scent is also wonderful starting in the afternoon until the whole night. With scent alone the gardener is already rewarded.
                                                                                                                                                                 

This Hoya obscura is scented too. The size of the umbel is much less than the H fungii, but it makes up for its size by having many umbels flowering at the same time per stem. As for the scent, i guess it is just like beauty that depends on the eye of the beholder. For me and my senses, i prefer its scent than the former. It is in the nose of the beholder. Others might have the opposite preference!          

GBBD

Today's Flowers

PS. This was published in May 2014, i was enticed to publish it again today to see that these plants are still growing now. However, due to the much extended dry season and hotter temperatures today, the flowers are not as plenty as last year. They are suffering the heat, just like us!