Its a hoya all right, but not a bella - looks like sulawesii to me. Maybe someone at the store mixed up the tags? Bella is a branching hoya, not a vining hoya - and the leaves are small triangular shapes.

You can look up EAs website, click on SHOW VARIETIES and they have a picture of sulawesii - and it is labeled as such, so I think tags got mixed up at the store you got it from. Treat it as you do most hoyas. I don't keep my bella any wetter than the others and its fine, but the climate you live in can have alot to do with that.

I just checked the EA website and they don't have the real bella. They do, however, have 2 plants - the mini wax leaf and the variegated - when you click on them, the "real" species
name comes up ( real according to EA anyway ) and for mini wax leaf, which is really H.lacunosa, it says "Hoya bella", and for the variegated one, which is I believe a carnosa commonly called Krimson Princess, they list it as "Hoya bella variegated" Neither of those hoyas, as far as I know, are bellas, and neither is the one you have.

Confused?? Sorry - but it looks like you have the EA sulawesii and someone put a tag from the lacunosa plant, which EA calls hoya bella, on the plant YOU bought.

Of course, EA also sells something called Marlea and something called Picta, both under the carnosa category, but there are no pictures of these on their site, so who knows - maybe you have one of THEM with the wrong tag on it.
Check out the site and google sulawesii - I think that is what you have.

It's still a hoya, so enjoy it anyway!

Hi eclipse, you will learn that EA has very nice plants but you must know two things, always repot the plant quickly and ignore the names that they give them, your plant in NOT a bella it is a probably a Hoya brevialata judging from your picture. it is also not a sulawesii since there is no such hoya, some retailers use sulawesi as a name when they are actually guessing that that is where it came from. Sulawesi (formerly Celebes ) is a large island in Indonesia. It is the world's eleventh-largest island and has many hoya there. Here's a site that helps identify hoya.

-Leon

Here is a link that might be useful: great hoya photos

Actually, the tag says "hoya sulawesi" and under that it says "hoya bella" So, apparently they are trying to cover their bases by having two names on it.

Hi Leon, maybe I should have been more clear - it's Hoya sp. sulawesii. Exotic Angel has a plant on their site that looks like the picture - and has it labeled Hoya sp. sulawesii. Whether one really exists or not, I don't know, I am not an expert, but there IS one in Exotic Angel's little world, and also you will find the name on other sites if you google it. Brevialata usually comes up in association with sulawessii, and also incurvula. I know there are alot of mislabeled hoyas out there, and EA has been selling quite a few of them, so who knows! Look up the brevialata flowers and only when it blooms can you be even close to sure.

About repotting EA plants in all cases, I have done it and lost the plant, I have NOT done it and the plant has thrived. It depends on the condition of the plant when you get it and how long it has been there in the store- if the pot is extremely heavy and waterlogged, with moss growing on the surface of the soil, and the plant has the signs of being overwatered, then I would MAYBE take a chance by repotting, but for the most part I would give it time to dry out well before watering again, and do this several times, giving the plant a chance to recover on it's own.
I have complained to EA by email more than once about their soil and I am not positive of this, but the most recent EA purchase of mine was a linearis and I do believe that the soil is different from the soil in my other EA plants. It would be nice to think that they might actually listen to their customers! The linearis, by the way, I have had all summer and did not repot and it is doing great. Also, alot of these plants are not much more past being well rooted cuttings, with still-shallow root systems, so I water sparingly - that helps keep them from getting too waterlogged too.

Hi Ines, I do not fault EA for their choice of potting soil, it works well for them as it holds water extremely well which I'm sure helps in shipping across the country but it is very hard for the average person to deal with this soil without rotting the roots, especially hoya. I congratulate you on secessfully using it but most would be better off repotting into a good fast draining mixture.

I know dealers use sp. to mean many things and one of those is "plant comes from" but this is not really a correct use of sp. and we all need to know that there is no hoya with a published name sulawesii except in a dealers catalog. There some sites like Christina's (myhoya.com) that have trustworthy information on names and photos that can be used to ID a hoya. The internet is a wealth if information but also a wealth of mis-information.

I looked up on the site that was posted here and it does look like it is a brevialata. I guess I won't know for sure until (and if) it blooms. Thanks for the help everyone.

My first guess was also brevialata. I got my EA tagged as incurvula, but with some research learned it was, in reality, brevialata.

I always repot EA plants because I simply feel more comfortable with my soil. But there are some that just aren't practical to repot. I have a Dischidia ruscifolia that would have been impossible to repot and it has done fine (uh - what am I saying? the thing has gotten massively huge!!!) in the EA soil. If they seem impossible to repot, I take cuttings just in case.

Denise in Omaha

Its a nice plant with good color you have, one I don't have, or well, USED to have...

If you would like to see H. bella and blooms, cut and paste, hit enter.

share.shutterfly.com/action/welcome?sid=8AcNG7JozatG_M

And now I'm going to contradict myself! I was told by more than one person that what I'd gotten as incurvula was brevialata. Since EA is notoriously wrong with their ID's, I assumed it was correct, even though I thought mine matched pics of incurvula. (Of course, brevialata is very similar...)

Well, got an e-mail from a lady over on Dave's site - the one who's about to publish a book about Hoyas. She said my brevialata IS incurvula and reconfirmed it when I sent her a pic of the flower. Soooo... incurvula it is, I guess!

Denise in Omaha

Plant...
{{gwi:926445}}
and flower...
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Hi Denise, I also bought an Exotic Angel "incurvula" that I was convinced by others that it is brevialata. Mine will climb and has elongated leaves (See photo).

Yours appears to have more "roundish" leaves than mine. Does yours climb? Mine has not bloomed so I guess I will stay with brevialata until it blooms or ......

-Leon

Eclipse,

If you're still around & want to see some real H bella, pls. see top post here called "Hoya Happenings" by Cena. In her post, the 3rd pic is a Bella, as she's captioned it.

Yikes Denise,

Gorgeous blooms & equally great pic, thanks for posting it!

My guess was brevialata too... until I read Denises' last post. Sulawesi is an island so just labelling the plant with that doesn't say much. I have other species from Sulawesi that look completely different (as they should as they are other species).

I bought my brevialata as incurvula too. Later I was told by a hoya authority it was brevialata. I've seen photos of the two species together and they do look alike but are at the same time different. From what I could se the leaves on incurvula were generally differently shaped and the plant not so compact.