okay, I'm a sucker for flower scents and was wondering, with the exception of h. lacunosa which everyone seems to LOVE, what your favorite scented hoya is??? Also, does anyone know if h. lobbii has any scent? Thanks...
SR
favorite bloom scents?
I don't remember any scent with H. lobbii. It's bloomed for me twice, and I don't remember smelling anything. But I think scent is very subjective.
Before you said "with the exception of lacunosa", I was gonna say lacunosa! I guess my second favorite would have to be H. motoskei. Smells like chocolate!
Gabi
I currently have H. nummularioides in full bloom in the gh,when it first began to bloom with only a few open umbels of flowers I liked it but now that it is covered with blooms I find it to be a bit overpowering.
Two that really appeal to me scent wise are H. cummingiana with a very bold spicy fragrance and H. heuschkeliana which if you close your eyes and inhale you would swear that you are smelling butterscotch candy.
Hands down, H. bella! Now if the thing would stay alive for me. I've owned 4 plants, bought them healthy from the nursery, but they all invariably wither and die. Sigh.
Julia
I've never been able to get any scent at all from any of my bellas. I know other people who claim they smell good too though, so it must just be me..or the bellas I raise. Ha.
I also like the smells of lacunosa, cv Sunrise, heuschkeliana, nummularioides, shepherdii, and australis. There are lots of others that smell good, but mine have yet to bloom, so I am still waiting to give my opinion on many of them.
Marcy
cv. Sunrise, obscura and lacunosa all smell the same to me - and heavenly! I like that my obscura blooms in the winter months, too.
Julia
Boy..not mine. My obscura smells like Fruitloops cerial. My lacunosa smells like carnations, And my cv Sunrise smells like Opium perfume.
Well, I only have three or four Hoya's that have bloomed for me but only two with fragrance. I'm pretty much a newbie to Hoya's. Lacunosa is wonderful .... DS-70 has fragrance but I can't really say I like the scent of that one. I can't wait for some of my others to bloom and scent the house with that perfume!
I have only had four of my hoyas bloom so I can only judge from them. I agree whole heartedly though that scent is very subjective as I am particularly sensitive to things that others don't even notice!
So to me....... h aff Finlaysonii was very pungent and not pleasing at night but light and pleasant during the day. H blashernazie had no scent what so ever and h. verticillata was wonderfully floral, strong and pleasing! I have a couple of small blooms on h. diversifolia right now and they smell very nice up close. If it was a full umbel at once I think it would be great.
I can't wait to smell h. motoskei....chocolate???
~Brenda
ummmmmmm ..... I sure wish we could smell through these computers!
Last winter I had a Lacunosa inside the house in the study .... small room. In the evening and at night the fragrance was soooo strong, I had to end up moving the plant back outside! It was a wonderful, lovely fragrance but just overpowering for the small room.
....... aaaaah, I wanna sniff that motoskei!
There is a French Hoya forum:
http://translate.google.com/translate?u=http%3A%2F%2Fhoyas.monforum.fr%2Findex.php&langpair=fr%7Cen&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&prev=%2Flanguage_tools
that is interesting. Go to the site (make sure you have the translated version), then scroll down to "the hoyas" & click on that...then scroll down to "the scent of hoya". Click on that & clear at the bottom of the list is one that is supposed to smell like ELEPHANT DUNG. Wow...I want to make sure I never get that one...ha ha.
Marcy
Well this is interesting....everything from carnations to elephant dung to chocolate!
I have to agree that bella is wonderful; I haven't been able to keep it alive for more than a year either, but the few blooms I had smelled fresh and light and sweet...very nice...
I'm so jealous of people who find cummingiana smells great...mine bloomed this past summer and I found it incredibly intense and smelling strongly of those little dried vegetable packets you get with soup mixes (heavy on the carrots) with an undertone of burning tires....yummmmm.....I will admit that on about day 5 of bloom, in the middle of the afternoon, at a distance of at least 6', I could detect the wonderful spice and fruit fragrance others mention...but at night or up close I found it just nasty....
Still waiting for my own lacunosa and nummularioides to bloom....
And thanks for the info on the lobbii...I guess it's too much to expect such beautiful blooms to smell nice too...
SR
Very cool! I would love an H. odorata if it smells like Jasmine! I just got H. cumingiana in the mail from a DG friend yesterday .... can't wait to smell that if it really does have the scent of green bananas, pineapple and coconut!
But, I will steer clear of the Orbea Semota that smells of Elephant Dung, the Vitelliana that smells like fungus and the Caudata that smells like rotten fruit!
My DS-70 has been blooming for quite a few weeks now and I am not real fond of the scent. Not real bad, just not real pleasant either. Does anyone else have this one? I can't really put a name on what it smells like ... but would much rather have it than something that smells of Elephant Dung!
Right now I just have a few generic/common Hoya's but I love them anyway. I hope to add to my collection through a friend who is visiting nurseries this week. I have tons of house plants and would love to have a Hoya Room, a Gesneriad Room and then another room for the every day houseplants!
I would say that motoskei smells similar to carnosa KP (I'm sure KQ and plain carnosa too, but those haven't bloomed for me yet. But I would say that motoskei smells a little stronger and more like chocolate than KP. It really makes me want to put some peanut butter on the flowers and eat em!
I was never able to smell a single thing when I put my nose right up to bella flowers. So strange how some flowers are very strong smelling for some, and smell like absolutely nothing to others.
Shelley, I agree - the beautiful blooms on H. lobbii (my favorite looking hoya blooms that I've seen in person) definitely make up for the lack of scent!
Gabi
I have either KP or KQ that a dear elderly friend gave me back in the mid 70's ... I've never noticed a fragrance on the blooms of that one! I also have a Hindu Rope Hoya (compacta?) blooming and I don't detect fragrance on that one either but have heard some say theirs are fragrant!
ummmmmmm .... Chocolate/Peanut Butter - now if ever a Hoya is found with that scent I will definitely have to have one! Although, I would probably gain a few pounds just smelling it!
Makes perfect sense that I couldn't remember if Lobbii had a scent or not - I guess if it did I'd sure remember it, because I do remember all the others! My recent flowers (12 this time!) still haven't opened, but I'm sure that I remember there being no scent whatsoever. Still plan on sniffing it tho...lol...
Christine
Ooooh...please do sniff...and don't forget to sniff at night as well as during the day...Of course, my lobbii is still just a little cutting so I'm really fantasizing here...but it's good to be prepared for when it suddenly takes off and bursts into bloom :-)
SR
The lobbii flowers started opening today, and about 8 of them are opened now. Strange scent, but there is definitely a light scent. The closest I can come to describing it would be to say that it's sort of medicinal, and almost like a bandaid smell. Not entirely pleasant, but not revolting either. So there's your answer. At least from my lobbii anyway. Its after 8PM here now and has been dark for at least three hours. Its actually been very gray, overcast and rainy since late morning. I don't know if that is relevant or not.
As far as favourite hoya scents go though, I'd have to vote for heuscheliana and its lovely buttery butterscotch smell. But then, only about a dozen of my hoyas have bloomed so far, so I don't have a wealth of hoya scent experience to draw from.
Christine
Oh, I just got a Heuschkeliana from a friend ... Now I can't wait for it to bloom after that description .... ummmmm butterscotch!
MMMMM.....chocolate, butterscotch... and carnations too? Sounds like heaven. Well, more Hoyas to add to my 'I've gotta have' list! The only blooms I've had from my Hoyas that were fragrant was one I bought as rubra - smelled like green bananas. I'd rather have chocolate!
with the exception of bella and tsangii and dcummingii, I really can't say I care that much for any of the hoya fragrances, they are a little too sweet for me. (this coming from someone who wears only Egytian Musk oil or men's cologne - sounds weird but I get more compliments on my "perfume" from men when I am wearing mens cologne than I ever do wearing the womens stuff!)
I like bella because it is so subtle and tsangii/dc because they have that food fragrance, but the rest of them just smell overwhelmingly like roses or easter flowers or nothing at all...except for carnosa and pubicalyx, which have a more distinct scent, definately too cloying and sweet, a chocolately almond flower fragrance. Sometimes when a flower first opens I will think it smells good, but after a few minutes I don't anymore.
The flowers sure LOOK good, though.
Bandaids???? I have the scent of bandaids to look forward to???...sigh...thanks so much Ceedub, and since you're in the same zone as me (6a), that's probably an accurate reading...
And I agree, the scent of the carnosa's and pubicalyx's is a little much...if I close my eyes and sniff I seem to go straight to some tropical jungle with a million things growing and blooming and dying and rotting...definitely an undertone of decay with both of those...I don't notice that with bella and I bet it's not there with lacunosa either....
I'm making a mental note to try some of those butterscotch-y ones too--sounds like a nice, simple fragrance.....
SR
I am not a big fan of the carnosa and pubicalyx flower scents. In fact when I grew my hindu rope in the house and it would come into bloom,I would always take it outside. It smells like cheap chocolate to me!!!!! Thank goodness it isn't one of those hoyas like nummularioides that when in bloom overwhelms the entire gh with it's aroma or i'd even have to move it from in there!!
Lacunosa does not have any undertones of decay at all in my opinion. It is a very sweet fragrance, it can be overpowering in a small room but it is a wonderful aroma. My hindu rope hoya has no scent whatsoever that I can detect.
I came from an Indiana farm, and to me the carnosas smell like baby chicken mash which is a ground up mixture of various grains and some dried molasses stuff that you feed to the chicks to make them grow.
It is not an unplesent smell to me, but just doesn't smell like chocolate, perfume, or flowers of any sort.
Jen...have you smelled the australis group? I can't believe anyone would not think that a pretty smell. Well...maybe a bit overpowering when many are blooming at once.
Marcy
I didn't find my nummularioides to be unpleasant when it only had a few peduncles open but when the entire plant popped with probably a 100 or more open bloom spurs then it became an issue. I found it to be quite overpowering and not much to my liking then!!!
At the moment numm is the only hoya that I have blooming and just as soon as I set one foot inside the door I can smell it and the plant is located all the way in the back corner of the building. I'm talking about 1 single 8" basket of hoya smelling up an 18 x 12 x 30 room. That's powerful stuff!!!!!
I am sitting here in the study enjoying the fragrance of Nummularioides right now .... but this is a small room and if I sit here too long I won't be able to breathe! The fragrance is lovely but just as the Lacunosa, it can be overpowering in this very small study! I will have to move it outside with the Lacunosa!
Lin,
It must be the best feeling in the world to be able to move plants from inside to outside at any time of the year. I would so love to have your weather. It is in the 30s here today, and we have an awful winter ahead with fuel oil prices going through the roof. For three years in a row my heating bill went up $500. If it keeps up at that pace, I may have to join all you sun worshipers and move to Florida.
Doug
I would like to know what elephant dung smells like....and how that person is in a position to know.... 8>)
I have too many favorites...H. archboldiana is one, H. cembra another...and I love them ALL!!!
Carol
the flower in question on that forum that is referred to as smelling of elephant dung is not a hoya at all but a stapelia (orbea semota v. lutea) of which I happen to have a full basket of. It doesnt really smell of elephant dung at ll but does have the aroma of rotting flesh or meat which is used to attract flies for pollination.
Sorry I dont have a pic of the flower but this is what the elephant dung plant looks like
Hoya24/Doug: I just can't imagine having to move tons of plants inside every winter and then back out in spring. My family has been in Florida for 40 years and even though the summer heat and humidity gets to be more and more unbearable each year, I will take the winters here any day! We are having nice fall type weather this week with low humidity and temps during the day in the mid 70's. I think tomorrow is supposed to be 69! Wonderful weather! I love the low humidity too but we are under fire watch because it is so dry.
Regarding those Hoya's with the awful smell - Yuck! I'm not sure which would be worse, Elephant dung or Rotting flesh. I've been to the County Fair and the Zoo and remember the smell of the Elephant area! I think I'd take that over the rotting meat smell .... but wouldn't want to have to smell it for very long.
I wonder why they would have a Stapelia listed with Hoya's? I have a Red Dragon Flower Huernia, that someone told me the bloom would smell bad, mine has a little flower on it right not but it doesn't have any scent at all. I just don't think I could own a plant for long that had a flower with a nasty scent! I know those rotten smelling ones are for a purpose of attracting flies and bugs but I sure don't want them in my house or yard. LOL.
Lin, hoyas and stapelias are all in the same family asclepiadaceae. The foreign page that had the info about hoya scents also had a link to other asclepiads which is where the part about elephant poo came into play!!!!
You'll find that a lot of hoya people also grow stapeleias. A few years ago I had quite a nice collection of them that consisted of around 80 varieites but after fighting mealy bugs for 5 years I finally bit the bullet and did away with all of them except about a half dozen.
Oh, I Love this Garden! I learn something new every day! Thanks dmichael ... I had no clue that Stapelias were in the same family as the Hoya! Do all Stapelias have bad smelling blooms?
Same family but I don't know just how closely related they are.
No all of the stapelias don't smell of a rotting corpse but there is only one that comes to mind that doesn't and that would be stapelia flavopurpurea which smells a bit like honey.
I just had to look it up in PF ... neat looking flower. I can't tell if it has thorns or not. If it's thorny I wouldn't want it, but I love that starfish looking flower!
no thorns.none of the stapelias have thorns.
Marcy, no, I have never smelled australis. Mine is probably blooming size, but I don't think it is getting enough light to bloom.
Interesting discussion...
Actually, hoyas and all are all part of the Apocynacea family...it was changed a couple of years ago and a long article about it in Asclepia about a year ago by Dr. Paul Forster. Interesting article...and a good magazine to receive for the more serious hoya growers.