I find that this Cactiguide.com site is a good one to get started looking for something on.. Half way down the page it has a "Identifying by cactus habit" , and then it is nose to the grindstone checking things out till you find what you are looking for. One can also do it by family. I do not always find their picture spot on because their is a lot of variation with in the pictures. I will then take a name and google it, go to the images and search further. This is often very boring and tedious if you are looking for immediate gratification. two days ago, I was looking for a astragalus species (3 - 4thousand in the astragalus family ) and all I had was a speckled seed pod and a location. No picture of the plant till afterwards . It took me about 6 hours but I got it . I did that differently. I went to the LBJ wildflower site and went through their 6 pages of astragalus in their database and looked for ones that their description mentioned New Mexico, and then went to the Gov. database linked on their page and it has map of the ranges (since I knew where it was collected) and the map can zero in to county distributions. If the right county or one close by was mentioned, I then googled images (also linked on the LBJ site) of that species to see if they had photos of the seed pod. I was lucky that it was a very distinctive seed pod. I did this with all the species that were from central New Mexico. I think there were over 20-30. It was Astragalus lentiginosus douglas ex hooker var diphysis. I sent the info to the woman who gave me the seed (NOT the woman who collected it). She sent me a photo of the plant after the fact that she got from the collector and I was right! I really felt I deserved a pat on my back. I was then able to find a photo of a population a couple miles from the collectors house and it was an exact match. I sent the info to the collector. It was a hard ID but it sure feels good to do it right. Keep your eye out for different Databases. You will get the hang of it if you just try to do a bit of detective work. Here is a link that might be useful: Cactiguide.com habit search

Yes definitly closer to Hoya finlaysonii and callistophylla but the Hoya pottsii group is a large one still so these species are still under that umbrella for now even considering their diversity. The leaves remind me of my Hoya sp. Kapit Borneo IML 1029 that I posted in the thread on leaves. That species has not been identified yet so not sure what it is but it is the plant that most resembles Xuan's plant of any other Hoya I have see so far although there are still so many out there that have not been collected and identified. Xuan are there purple veins on the underside of your plants leaves or are they solid green? Mike

Xuan that's good to hear I like seeing your jungle collected plants. Do you grow any orchids in your garden? Hills that's just it these species are variable and because Xuans plant is a wild collected seed grown plant and not a cutting grown plant (essentially a clone) that is passed around from grower to grower there will be quiet a range of leaf and flower sizes and colours. The Hoya pubicalax cultivars are a perfect example of variation within a species when seedlings are selected for their different traits. My Hoya carnosa has speckles on most of the leaves so I am still leaning towards Hoya dasyantha but there is no real certainty unless it were identified by a trained botanist. Both Hoya carnosa and Hoya dasyantha are found in the boarder region of Vietnam and Southern China, Hoya fungii was collected on the island of Hainan in the gulf of Tonkin if I remember correctly but I can't find the source where I found that info. The plant in the link is also unidentified, who knows there can be naturally occurring hybrids where species overlap in their natural ranges so that can just add to the confusion. I agree that my Hoya carnosa has more rounded or almost squared corolla lobes where Xuan's plant has more pointed or acute lobes. The leaf surface also appears less shiny that my Hoya carnosa but I am not sure that is a distinguishing feature. In the description that is given in the link below the acute angles of the corolla lobes is mentioned as well as slightly raised leaf veins so those two characteristics may be enough to separate Xuan's plant from Hoya carnosa. Xuan are the veins on the leaf slightly raised? Mike Here is a link that might be useful: Hoya dasyantha description Flora of China

I want to start off by saying I have no idea what the last plant really is. That being said it looks very close to a plant of mine that I have labeled as Gasteraloe 'Midnight' which depending on sun can range from a dark green to like a redish purple in color. Your other Aloe are very lovely by the way. I also have one like your "Jungle" that I've been trying to identify for quite some time.