Quinn

all the hoyas that you listed grow like weeds for me. The later 2 rigida and cinnimomifolia will root easily and start out slow to begin with. But once they take hold you can almost watch those 2 grow!! Mathilde and heuschkeliana are 2 of my best growers.

If you really want to talk SLOW !!!! Try hoya hypolasia (quite possibly the worlds slowest growing hoya) or dennisii or cv. Chouke or griffithii just to name a few!!!

David

Quinn
I only have heuschkeliana and mathlide and mathlide is very slow growing, in fact I was gifted a rooted cutting 6 months a go and it is still the same as the day I got it.Heuschkeliana is a fast grower for me.It will be interesting in what others have to say.

Cindy

Now, I'm not 100% sure I have Mathilde or Chouke, as the person who sent it to me has both but forgot which she sent. I'm inclined to think it is Mathilde though.

This is exactly the kind of thing I wanted to know... It seems for heuschkeliana, it might be me... I suspect heuschkeliana might want more light and maybe then it will take off for me. Rigida has definitely been working on making roots; it's in a clear pot and I can see them all over. I see the tiniest hints of leaves starting, I hope it is the beginning of it taking off running.

Yes, I am interested in what others have to say too... and it will be neat to compare how things seem to grow in one location vs another, if there is a pattern.

Quinn,

I think you'll find that a lot of them seem to be slow in the beginning. And even more so if they are rooted plants as opposed to cuttings, which is the opposite of logic IMO. I find that if I buy cuttings, they root fast this time of year and start growing relatively quick. I got my Liddle cuttings on July 15th, and all but a couple are firmly rooted, and a couple have even put on some new growth. When I get established plants, it seems that they are thrown into dormancy and it can take up to a year for me to see any significant growth.

A good example is crassicaulis. I got mine from CBFM in April 09 and I think it put on one set of new leaves late last summer and that was it. Just in the last month or two, it's suddenly started to grow, and pretty fast at that! Hueschkeliana was a slow starter for me, too, and though I wouldn't say it grows like a weed, it does put on steady growth now. 'Mathilda' was one I got last year from Gardino's and it didn't do much last summer. This year, though, it's grown quite a lot. I've had some trouble with rigida, though I think I've gotten it resolved and it seems to be growing, albeit not fast yet. Cinnamomifolia is another CBFM plant I got 2 years ago that went into a deep dormancy. I practically lost it this spring, so I recently chopped it back and rooted the cuttings and it's looking much better, though hasn't started to grow yet.

I'm going to bet that the pubicalyx cultivar will take off eventually. It seems ALL those pubicalyx's are crazy growers!

I think another factor is whether you're growing yours inside or outside. If they're out in the heat and humidity, they do tend to grow faster. My inside Hoyas seem to maintain steady growth, whereas the ones in the GH go a little nuts when the weather is hot and humid. Which is why this time of year, I'm more likely to put an ailing plant or rooting cutting outside on my back deck in a shady spot, because the heat and humidity gives them a real boost, even more so than the rooting aquarium.

Denise in Omaha

Like Mike, heuschkeliana grows like a weed for me and is in constant bloom. It's been such a pleasure that I want to collect them all. I have been growing mine in an extremely unprotected eastern exposure 4th floor window that burns a lot of other plants, but the heuschkeliana seems to love it and only burns if a leaf gets pressed right up against the glass. All the plants in that location guzzle water (I water those every 2-3 days), so it is always drying out (not all the way of course).

I've been growing 'Chimera' under lights for its entire lifetime and it seems like an average to fast grower for me. I think it could probably grow faster, though, so I'm going to tweak its conditions after I move - finally signed my lease papers yesterday!

The Hoyas that grow the slowest for me so far are the australises and diptera although I might be speaking out of turn because they just all put out a heavy growth spurt. I might have finally made them slightly happy? They were under lights before and just... stayed almost the same size for a year. Of course, apparently Knitty's australis grew like a weed for her, so it's clearly just ME! D:

I agree with Denise that some are slow to start but then they grow very quickly. I find that many really take off in their second year.

Mike

I just went back and reread Denise's post more carefully, after what you said, Mike, and haha I must have been skimming before.

I had noticed that the cuttings take off right away, and had just erroneously attributed it to them being faster species! I had understood that it could take plants a long time to start their initial growth, but it was hard for me to really internalize when some of the rooted plants and almost all of the cuttings were putting out new growth from day 1. Now I'll be slower to think I need to change a variable when I've had a plant for under 2 years. (As long as the conditions I have it in reasonably match my research).

I've been thinking that...no hoya is a slow grower...they are either growing or they are not?
I have plants that sit for a year and then take off growing a few feet that season..is that a slow grower or a fast grower?
Also...the varieties that continually bloom rarely put out growth until they are finished. Then they take off as if to make up for lost time.

Just a thought open for discussion?

Am at the office, so am doing this from memory, not from walking through & doing a visual review.

Well, I'd say one of my slowest is Australis variegate, really pretty, but slow as molasses & sometimes will get new growth, get me all excited, just to abort or shrivel off & drop the new growth. This summer it was new growth sprouting from the mix (doubly exciting), in Spring it was a new branchlet.

Another slow one is one tentatively IDed as Vittelinoides / Meredithii. I was given a replacement cutting of this & had it rooting in a bag of long sphag, when I got the call that my terminally ill Dad had died & I rushed off to FLA to be w/ family. While I was gone, the cutting bloomed IN THE BAG, was finishing blooming when I returned home & found it that way. On hearing that, I friend said it was my Father passing by. I've had the cutting since May 07 when Dad died, til now, it's exactly ONE LEAF & ONE NODE -- arggggh! (I'd received this from a founding member of my Plant Society for helping to ID this for her. It had bloomed once for her & based on comparing its blooms to pix, I'd found this ID for her.

As to Bhutanica: I'd recently received some from Denise (May 09), it has sat all this time doing nothing & just recently decided to throw 2 new stems breaking through from the mix. Unfortunately, in NYC it's been in the high 90s & I have no AC; I think it aborted these two new vines, I was getting SO excited!!!

OMG, Karen, how do you handle that kind of heat without A/C?? You must be miserable. I know old apartments back east probably don't have central A/C, but surely you can have a window A/C??... Once bhutanica gets going, you're going to be amazed at how fast it grows!

So, GG, where will you be living in our fair city? How long will you be here? How do you plan to transport your plants? That can be such a challenge! I haven't moved in many years, but I remember moving them from place to place when I was young...

LucieLove, you're right. They tend to halt growing while blooming. My nicholsoniae bloomed up a storm the spring, then once it quit blooming, it took off growing like crazy.

Denise in Omaha

I really like Joni's theory that there are no slow Hoyas, just growing or not growing Hoyas. Seems like a happy-making perspective.

PG: lol...I'm glad I'm not the only one trying to sneak by this summer w/out A/C! I never bothered to put my window unit in (in Minneapolis) and... I'm going to be regretting it this weekend I'm sure. I'm too much of a wimpy baby for hot NYC, though. After my last trip I decided that henceforth summer NYC just doesn't exist for me.

Denise: I'll be living on the edge of downtown, halfway between Old Market and the beginning of Midtown. Near Kountze Memorial.

I don't know how long I'll be here! At least 3 years I hope, b/c I have a MASSIVE amount of books and it's hell to move. ^_^

99% of my plants are already living in the corporate apartment in Old Market, so after I've moved in all my furniture (this weekend) and finished repainting the living room, I'll just drive them over one carload at a time lol! The worst will be the rooting aquariums, I guess.

I guess my definition of a slow grower is one that puts out a few leaves a year? I think one that takes off and gives you a few feet by the end would be considered a fast grower, for sure. That would be fun to see!

For instance, kerrii would be a slow grower for me. I forgot to mention it before, because it sometimes looks like it isn't doing anything at all. But it does plug away, just slowly. I'm looking at it now from across the room, and I've noticed only now that the bare vine it has put out has creeped up to being about 2 ft long. I can't wait til it fills in; there are at least 2 peduncles on that vine!