I just got this one too, shanna!!

Now let's see what they will do..

Congrats Raven. I really like those round thick leaves.

shanna

You will like this one, it takes a few months to get going but once it does, it gets big fast!

Ines
Good I'm excited about this one... You have obovata? Tell me how you care for yours lighting, watering etc. Fast draining soil mix like other hoyas?

Shanna

Nice choice Shanna, I too love the leaves, something about the speckles...its very cute!!

Thanks Nancy

shanna

Beautiful! It's one of my dream-hoyas :) I can't find it anywhere. I think I'll have to buy it online from Germany at some point... Congratulations!

I really love the obovata! It remains one of my favorites. And, it really does grow like a weed - it'll be eating you out of house and home very soon - and it is an early & easy bloomer.
Enjoy,
Ann

Ines
Yes, it would be painful to make my obovata into 2 cuttings. From looking at the picture I posted above where do you suggest I cut it at? Do you have a picture of your obovata? If so I'd love to see it.

Ann
Thanks for the obovata bloom picture, very nice. What does it smell like? I can't wait for it to grow like a weed. I'm a little impatient wouldn't you say? I just got it yesterday for crying out loud!! I keep telling myself these hoyas are teaching me patients.

Shanna

you could cut it just above the first set of leaves, then remove the next set and that node where they were will be the under-the-soil-level bottom of the second cutting.

Anyone can correct me if I am wrong, I would imagine that most people are like I was when I first started rooting from cuttings - in the beginning, you want to leave them whole, but after a while, you realize that they will do better, and the plant will be much fuller, if you cut them into halves, or 3 pieces if the cutting is big enough. All you really need to root is one bare node and one set of leaves, and on some hoyas, obovata included, you don't even really need that bare node.

I think I have a pic of my plant from last summer, if I remember to pick up batteries this weekend I will take another more recent one. Right now I am off to a b'day party for a 4 yr old, one that I am actually excited about because they are having farm animals there, baby lambs and goats and a pony too...

Beautiful plant Shanna!

It's good to know they grow fast for others, mine hasn't grown a lick since I bought it in October. I just cut mine back because I left it outside and some of the leaves got nasty looking spots. I hate spotty plants. I have about 10 cuttings rooting, so at least I'll have a fuller plant soon, eh? I feel really bad because the branches were over 4 ft long, now they're about 6 in, ugh!

Very nice bloom Ann, thanks for posting...

Shanna, nothing wrong with being impatient! :-)
As for the scent, it's got a nice sweet scent, but I don't know what it smells like. It's nice because it's not too pungent, but strong enough to know it's in bloom.
I agree with Jen. Cut that baby up and root yourself up a full pot 'o obovata.
:-)
Ann

Shanna,

I got my obovata from the same seller probably over a year ago. It was a large established plant in a 6" pot and has definitely grown, but nothing to write home about. Maybe it's just my conditions. I'm still waiting patiently for blooms! Hopefully one of us will get blooms soon :)

Gabi

Shanna ,id cut it into as many 2 node pieces as possible,start it in a 4" pot and let it do it's thing. I've been growing my mother plant for about 3 years now. It was in an 8" basket when I bought it but it wasn't very big at all. I take cuttings (usually 4-6 nodes) from my plant all the time and i no time,usually within a month it's not unusual for me to have vies 3ft long already.

Ines hit it on the head when she said when it takes off it really takes off!!!

You've seen the plant already but i'll post it again here since this thread is after all about H. obovata!!! If grown right and it likes what you're doing this is what you can have in 3 years!!!! And you wouldn't believe the FEET of vine that i've removed from this plant to share with people and it just bounces back!!!!

Thanks everyone for your input and picture David. I will really be sad to cut my new obovata but you all know a lot more about hoyas than I do, so if I get time I will do it tonight, if not tonight as soon as I can. Now that you all have me thinking about cutting obovata, I probably have a few others that need it too.

So I counted and I can probably get 4 cuttings out of the obovata I posted a pic. of above? That would be making a cutting at each node. What do you all think?

Mentha,
I did the same cutting job to a pothos I had gotten from my grandma. It had a couple really long vines had some leaves missing and just didn't look well. I took it into the living room and chopped it into maybe 20 pieces and my husband asked if I was trying to kill it? It has been maybe a year and it really looks good now, I keep it on my bathroom counter with one northern window blinds open during the day.

Gabi
Yes, I hope you get blooms soon. I recall you saying you have all your hoyas in Eastern exposure. I put my obovata in southern exposure (late afternoon sun).

shanna

Shanna, as long as each cutting you get out of it has a node and then it's own set of leaves at the next node, you should be fine - BUT don't get carried away, the growth at the tip may be too young to make a proper cutting - if you can snip two or three out of it to pop into a 4", that would be sufficient..though if part of any of the stems seem to have little root nubs, you could use that in place of a node. Really, you don't have to have a node in alot of cases, but I just think it is better to have them if possible. Alot of little rooting hormones or rooting genes or whatever are congregated around the nodes.

Gabi, last year I think our obovata's were about the same size, and mine had not bloomed yet. I put it on a high shelf practically below a skylight for the winter, and it has grown ALOT since then, and finally is going to bloom. It is the light that seems to make the biggest difference for hoyas in my environment - no matter what else I do, if I supply optimal light, the plants grow much, much more quickly.

Well yes, the more light I supply with any hoya, the more they grow and bloom. The obovata is right next to an east facing window all Winter long. And it is outside the whole spring/summer (last year and again this year), but no blooms. Oh well....I still love the plant.

Gabi

Well, I'm happy to say three days later my cuttings have half inch roots! So they got potted up with the mother plant today, she needed to be repotted anyway. I hope none of the cuttings die due to the heat. Maybe my plant will take off now that I underpotted her and it's gotten warmer.

On a side note, I found a compacta in a 4 in pot for $4 today. A couple other hoyas, and an epiphyllum from my 2 favorite nurseries and 2 rhipsalis from HD came home with me also. I spent all afternoon repotting with my own mix in clay pots. With the roots teased out they almost didn't fit back into the same size pots. It's funny the hard grown carnosa I got today has way thicker leaves than the GH grown ones I got a few days ago from the grocery store.

Shanna,

I've grown obovata for many years (I can't even remember when or where I got it) and it is a good grower, and once it starts blooming, it really pumps them out! Mine didn't bloom much last year because I repotted it up to a bigger pot, but it's going into bloom mode now and will probably bloom all summer. It's one of those that is pushing new buds behind a flowering peduncle, even before the flowers are open!

I finally got my silver-flecked clone a couple weeks ago...
{{gwi:958209}}
...My old one has no signs of flecking at all, so I'm pretty excited about getting this one! So here's a photo of flowers from last year...
{{gwi:958210}}

Denise in Omaha

Sorry Gabi, I wasn't immplying that you don't know that light makes hoyas do well.. I think what I meant was that with the skylight, the constant bright light overhead is what made this plant take off, the skylight giving light like a plant would get in a greenhouse (and we have all seen how plants grow in a greenhouse environment) When a plant is in a window, even the best window, it is not going to get the same kind of light. Of course, I have a few other hoyas under those skylights that are NOT blooming, so maybe with my obovata it was a combo of being so rootbound, and the light, and the 3 or 4 foot vines. One of my favorites too!

Denise
thanks for posting the pictures. Your obovata is very nice with all the silver flecking. Mine has some as you can see above but not as much as yours.

shanna