I have been reading as much as I can on Hoyas. Going thu the old ones on our hoyas forums. Were is the MSN Forum??? also dose anyone know if the Book Succulent Lexion Asclepiadaceae is still in print?? And is there a Hoya Society in Tucson or close by? If there is I can't seem to find it. :(
Thanks again
OK I give up
I can help you out with the link for the MSN forum:
http://groups.msn.com/AsclepiadaceaeHoya/messages.msnw
hope that works and helps you out...only downside there is no Search feature there...
Sandy
I know a hoya freak in Tuscon...or is it Phoenix? No, I think it is Tuscon...email me if you want her name?...Carol
Binky, it is still in print but pricy, (Illustrated Handbook of Succulelnt Plants ASCLEPIADACEAE) just published recently. Is a little hard to follow, many appreviations for words, and if you are not used to the Botanical terms, and it's your first Botanical book, then I wouldn't suggest it. Dales book may be filled with so called errors, but it can be followed, and does have good information. The Fraterna is a good journal, will not critize others. I would recommend. You would do much better with Christines book, well written, but I find it often hard to follow and a bit confusing, her pictures are great, it was done with love, both give better information on growing. I use both all the time. If you can find Lois Duffy, I think she will reprint the Hoyan and perhaps her book for you as well. she carries all of the old Hoyan journals.
Dale Kloppenburg will reprint some of his for you. Chris Burton may be able to reprint hers as well, ask Carol Noel about this. The books from Australia are great, well done and pictures are line drawing, most are done very well, Dr. Forester is a professional Taxinonmist (spelling?) David Liddle works for him carries no degree that I know of. But either did Hermann Jacobsen (wrote the last Lexicon of Succulents) nor Gordon Rowley, nor Myron Kimnack. (Gordon has written 60+ books (teaches at Reddings U. in England) Myron Kimnack (ex curator of the Huntington Gardens) currently writing a book on Palms Trees.
Books cost $80,000 to publish, and you must quarantee the publisher a certain amount of sales. It's not a easy task if you are not wealthy. Norma
Garden Web - (holding up a lucky charm as not to be struck for mentioning that name) does have a Search feature...and I believe it works even if you are not signed up. Good way to get some specific information...not always correct, however.
Binky...will send you Tammy's address today...she is the woman who lives in Tucson.
My criticism of Kloppenburg's book is simply that he does not seem to make an effort to be correct: using the same leaves (one turned in a different direction from the other) to ID two different plants is not responsible, in my book. Blatent geographical errors as to where plants were found.... Wrong photos used to ID plants. If these easy to correct errors were left in...how can I trust the rest of his information? That is the reason for comparing it to Burton's Critique...Christine Burton uses research based information for her opinions and statements.
And while "some" of Kloppenburgs information may be correct, who is to know which it is? Not worth the $60 in my book.
I know, Norma, at one time I recommended this book to you...and I apologize. I was starting out in Hoyas and didn't know a peduncle from a pendulum!
But I'm finding the same thing in all books, pictures switched.
It is still full in information. It's a matter I'll forgive you for your sins if you will forgive me form mine. He does make corrections. Gosh how do you make corrections once it is in print? I'm sick about the crassula book, no correction either.
We still judge the plants name according to what the flowers tell us? Or am I wrong.
I guess someone should just do a leaf book so we can Identify them by leaf. I notice when writers are showing the picture of the flowers, they don't have room to give a clear picture of the leaves as well, or the pictures are not sharp, or the leaf is never in full view. I really wouldn't buy a leaf book. I would want to touch them, see the colors and texture.
Leaaves just don't do it for me.
I know where I can get at least four of Kloppenburg's books I still like them, and enjoy them. I guess I didn't notice the leaves, I do notice the flowers. His writting I can understand, and it doesn't mix me up goiong backwards and forwards. He doesn't change his mind mid paragraph, he doesn't muddy up the waters. He does get localities mixed up. but Im not at that level that I care. Many elevations are given and to the botantist at the Huntington Gardends that is important. Picky information I really don't care about, even if he misspells a word, who am I to critize, I caught misspelling in all publications. Sheesh I've only been doing this less than 2 years. I was only mentioning books that are available now.
All books are good, if you can get them. The question was what books are available. Not to clitique them. I didn't single any one out for criticism. If you notice I mentioned all books that I know are available I did not critize them. There is also a place called Brooks Books here in Calif. Still Check with Rainbow Gardens and see what if left. The have some speciality books on the Philippines, Malaya, Australis, you are all able to make up your own minds, on what is good or bad for you. Norma
Brooks books are out of business. I did check it out,
Try that ABE book source. I got my Pelargonium books from them.
My opinion of Mr. Kloppenburg's books is that they are much worse than having no books at all.
You may think you can follow him but I'd like to really see you try. He is so confused about everything that he writes that the best that can be said about them is that they are big jokes!
You may think he tells you that certain hoyas were found at some particular place and he'll tell you just where that place is located but in every book he has written, I have found only one single location that he ever got right. In most cases he doesn't even get the right hemisphere. An example here is a hoya published as Hoya bandaensis, which comes from the island of Banda which is in the southern hemisphere, about 60-90 miles SW of the island of Ambon in the Moluccas and not too far west of Irian Jaya (western New Guinea). Mr. K. put it NW of the tip of the island of Sumatra in the northern hemisphere.
You say he doesn't contradict himself but he does, constantly. One of hundreds of examples is in his statements about a single species which he claims is really two different species. I refer to the names Hoya incrassata and Hoya crassicaulis. Hoya crassicaulis is found on page 80 of his World of Hoyas. In the last sentence on that page, he said (in comparing the two), "The foliage of the two species are nearly identical but Hoya crassicaulis has a much larger clusters of flowers." Grammatical error there is his.
Then on page 124, in his Hoya incrassata description (2nd paragraph) he said, "The foliage of these species vary considerably." That grammatical error is his too.
The pictures of these two on pages 81 and 125 certainly look to be from the same plant to me, but if you'll keep reading and go to page 151 you'll see the same identical species misrepresented as Hoya macgregorii. In this case he actually used the same branch of the same plant pictured on page 125 as Hoya incrassata. If you'd like to see what a true Hoya macgreogorii looks like, send me an e-mail and I'll send you proof that Hoya macgregorii is an extremely different species with flowers much smaller (actually an entire umbel is only about 18-20 mm. in diameter and four or five of its mature leaves would fit on one of those pictured by Kloppenburg.
Mr. Kloppenburg, not only doesn't know where the plants he writes about are native and where those habitats are, i. e., he proves in his writing that he doesn't know east from west or north from south, but he also proves he doesn't know up from down. Example of that: His picture of Hoya imbricata in World of Hoya shows a tree with Hoya imbricata growing up its trunk. You can see that the tree picture is upright as the branches are at the top of the picture and you can see daylight shining through the foliage. There are several rather long blooming peduncles growing there and each of those peduncles of flowers are pointing straight down toward the bottom of the page. In the text on the opposite page, he said that the flowers of Hoya imbricata bloomed in UPRIGHT umbels. The upper case is mine.
There is not a single page in the entire book that doesn't have an error on it. Some are serious errors, some not so serious but at a price amounting to two weeks' grocery money, anyone but a millionaire should feel cheated --- but only the millionaire and I are likely to complain --- me because I say it like it is and the millionaire because complaining about such things is how he hangs on to his money!
In spite of these and the hundreds of errors I found in it, it is the best of his books. The worst are Phillipine (Sic) Hoya Species and his Dictionary of Hoya Terms. The first contains at least 2 thousand factual errors that can be easily documented by any researcher except all of you who think that the subject can be researched on the WWW or in popular publications. The Dictionary can be shown to be a big joke book with 90% of its "definitions" wrong very easily with only four references. Those four are are: 1). Stearn's Botanical Latin, 2).TheConcise Oxford Dictionary of Botany, 3) Almost any Dictionary of Word Roots and Combining Forms (I use Borror's) and 4) An English language dictionary (I use the American Heritage College Dictionary).
There is no excuse for anyone writing and passing off such tripe as this man writes. He gets away with it only because people dumber than he is are too lazy to go back to the source and check the facts and because people dumber than he is crucify anyone with guts enough to expose his ignorance. The best thing that could happen to the furtherance of Hoya knowledge is if someone would take Mr. K. high up on some foreign mountain and give him 100% accurate directions to get home and send him back ahead. With his knowledge of directions, we'd never hear another word from him again!
Such people remind me of the late Eugene Talmadge of Georgia, who was loved by illiterates because, to get their votes, he stooped to their level by doing such things as attending a fund raising tea and drinking punch directly out of the punch bowl using the punch ladle as a dipper and then by pouring the undrunk portion back in the punch bowl when he was done.
One thing I know and that is that anyone using anything Dale Kloppenburg has ever written as reference material to learn the identity of anything will come away less informed than before they ever read the first word he wrote. The man simply doesn't know what he writes about.
He told you in his Hoya Handbook that he had not researched his subject and at the rate he has continued to write books since then, he hasn't had time to research.He also told you on page 61 of the same book that he would not tell you the correct names of hoyas but would tell you the names that came on them when he got them. He then added that you might have gotten the same ones with different labels but, he added, that the reason he wouldn't tell you the correct identities was because he didn't want to confuse you. I think his reason was because he was so confused himself.
I know that this letter will probably get me thrown off this forum. I know because Dave wrote and warned me that some of you had written to him and wanted me removed before I had written the first word here.
That was proof enough to me that those of you who wanted me removed don't want to know the truth about hoyas unless it comes from someone who doesn't know anymore than you do. Some of you appear to only give lip service to wanting to know about hoyas and that what you really want is someone to stroke your insecure egos and tell you how smart you are!
If only one person reads this and is helped by it, I'll have done someone a good turn. That is all I ask.
Chris Burton.
Binkey1972, wrote you an e-mail regarding you request. Did you receive it, for you mentioned something came back?if not the answer is yes regarding that
Best regards,
E-mail me Ingrid
When I wrote that the Asclepiad publication mentioned above had 33-35 hoyas featured, I was estimating. I went back and counted them. It featured 55 species, which is still more than 100 less than we had been told further up the page. I also looked more closely at the synonymy cited and found several serious mistakes. I looked more closely at the pictures and believe I can prove that at least a third of them are mislabeled.
Chris Burton.
Binky...forget the MSN forum... It used to be informational and interesting....but it has disintegrated into a petty name calling forum.... alas.... We can't let that happen here.
;o}}}}}
We all want to know the truth about hoya's,We just want it done in the manner of respect,not in name calling and always down on people who have feeling,when I was growing up I was always taught to respect others the way you want to be respected,but why do you always attack people who want to learn? it's not right calling out people who make mistakes.Your forum is MSN and it moves very slow and now that you are here this one is moving slow also! I just don't see where I payed to become a member and it is ending up reading your rambling on post about everything thats wrong! why don't you get to your book so we can all learn it threw the book and don't have to read your cold post! People get fed up.I think you joined here just to stir up trouble and that is WRONG!