PlantFiles: Hoya, Wax Plant, Porcelain Flower
Hoya australis subsp. tenuipes

My Hoya plant is an indoor plant. I have had it for over 5 years and it has bloomed twice. I love the smell of the flowers!!!

The leaves on my plant are much smaller than those pictured.

This has been one of my best performing Hoyas over the last year. In that time it has grown from little more than a rooted cutting into a fairly large plant that is now beginning to bloom quite well. The plant is in growth almost constantly rather than some Hoyas that tend to grow in spurts. The new growth is rather easy to train on a support with leaves that mature over several months. The leaves are attractive and are almost as wide as long. Younger leaves (and stems) are bright green and lightly covered with very fine hairs. As they mature leaves tend toward deeper green and the hairs less noticeable. The larger mature leaves are about 4.5" wide and 5.5' long and to my mind resemble the leaves of the common rubber plant (Ficus elastica) though not quite as large or as dark.

I've been growing the plant in a window facing SSW, allowing it as much light as it can take without burning. Most of the year it's kept close to the window, moving it about a foot back during the peak summer sun. It is exposed to cool nights, as low as 50 degrees. It has been freely forming small peduncles at about half of the leaf nodes. it started blooming in the late summer with just one or a few flowers at scattered peduncles. The number of flowers per peduncle has been increasing. Currently, in mid-autumn it has one umbel of 20 flowers with several other peduncles just starting to develop buds. The flowers are delightfully fragrant with a spicy-sweet scent that is not at all overwhelming, even at night when the fragrance is strongest.

Overall a very attractive plant even when not in bloom, has been relatively easy to grow and flower. Highly recommended.

This is one of my favorite Hoya's because of the fact that it seems to be an easy grower for me. The potting medium I use is the same thing I use for almost every other plant I grow, a combination of potting soil and orchid bark mix. I used to throw in some perlite but haven't added that in a couple of years.

I let this plant get almost totally dry, then water thoroughly with the garden hose, making sure I saturate the potting medium until the water is pouring out the drain holes of the pot. I live in an area with year-round humidity which helps with moisture. The location I keep this one is my screened pool enclosure, where it receives filtered sun most of the day. The white blooms are pretty and extremely fragrant in the evening.