Tuesday, December 05, 2006

Hooray - The Lacunosa "Tove" Starts to Grow!

I got this plant six months ago in a trade with a Swedish girl. I decided to bring it into work, with rooting hormone on it, but it just sat there, not rooting. After a while the leaves started to look a bit shrivelled so I got concerned. I cut off some nodes to try and get at least some of it to root, but still nada. In the end I placed all the cuttings in water. A couple of weeks later, bingo, roots start growing. I think, hooray, maybe now they'll be happy. I thought too soon. I place the now-rooted plants back in their pot and the plants continue to look sad and unhappy (don't ask me how I know this, they just did. The leaves just kept looking withered). Another couple of weeks go by, and the plants just aren't doing well and haven't fixed themselves in the soil. Around this time I get a little plant incubator for the cuttings I got from Paul Shirley. I decide to take the Lacunosa home and place it in the incubator. I pot all my new aquisitions that aren't doing very well, including the Lacunosa, into Jiffy 7's. Two thirds of the cuttings from P.S. root, the rest die probably because I did something wrong (too cold/too humid/not enough sun etc etc) and the lacunosa is still sat in the incubator not really rooting and not really dying. Finally this cutting fixes itself into the soil and starts looking happier again (the leaves filled out...) so I take it out of the incubator and place it on the cuttings shelf - my lounge window, a place where all cuttings that have finally fixed themselves in the soil are left until I have too many and have to figure out whether they'd cope being upstairs instead. Finally, one month later it's sprouted its first new leaf. Yay, and possibly phew! Now all I have to wait to grow is the pentaphlebia...

2 comments:

Sandy said...

What a pain in the butt hoyas can be sometimes!.....great to hear it finally started to get going....sometimes they just sit there for no reason.....lacunosa "Tove" is with the pinkish blooms right?....bet it smells as good as the others!....

Sandy

roybe said...

I think we get used to the ease at which the likes of H. carnosa and pubicalyx take root. Then we strike the slower and more difficult ones. It would be good to be able to pick the brains of the more experienced growers to know which is best for various species, soil v water. But then I suppose what works for one might not work for another. I suppose there are so many other factors come into play light,humidity etc. Anyway Hills I'm glad to see the little red new growth on your Lacunosa "tove". I don't think that one is available here.

Roy