Sunnyjenni Hoya and more

Hoya ranauensis formerly known as Hoya sp. Poring Hot Springs

Hoya ranauensis

Formerly known as Hoya sp. Poring Hot Springs.

Another favorite of mine. The leaves are large up to 10" with splashy and wavy edges.
The venation on the leaves is just gorgeous too.

Discovered in Eastern Sabah, Borneo. Flowers are large finlaysonii type. They have a strong lemongrass scent with a hint of Jasmine. I love this combination.

This is a very large splashy leaf Hoya. Another spectacular fast-growing Hoya to add to your collection!
The huge shiny leaves can grow up to 9" long.
It grows multiple growth points on all nodes and from the base while growing. Easy growing Hoya I recommend even for beginners.

The low-maintenance Hoya ranauensis plant needs minimal care and does not need a greenhouse to be happy.

Mine flowered 15 months from cutting. Flowers are beautiful even before they open and lasted 8 days. The first peduncle keeps reblooming and lots of new peduncles keep coming from spring to late summer.

Amorphophallus konjac 'GORDON'S GOLD'

Amorphophallus konjac 'GORDON'S GOLD'

Voodoo Lily

Named after Dave Gordon, a plant collector and a former nursery owner in California.

Amorphophallus are very interesting plants. One species of this arum has the largest unbranched inflorescence in the world, the titan arum. Amorphophallus titanum is endemic to Sumatra. Due to its odor, like that of a rotting corpse, the titan arum is characterized as a carrion flower and is also known as the corpse flower or corpse plant.

Konjac is one of the species of Amorphophallus that I grow and I love all the four cultivars of this species that I have. 'Leo Song', 'Gordon's Gold', 'Nightstick', and the regular konjac. They have beautiful markings that are totally different from each other. They also look like small palm trees with out-of-this-world markings on the petiole. They also produce just a single leaf per season! Yes, just one. A single beautiful leaf that lasts from spring to fall. There's more about this plant, When in bloom it produces an odor like a dead animal! 😖 The smell is intended to attract the carrion flies that are its natural pollinators.

Personally, it's all worth the wait. The flower is very unique, huge, and gorgeous. I can't wait to post mine on Instagram! 😂

'Gordon's Gold' is a spectacular addition to a garden. My corm last year (2021) was a huge 5 pounds split into two blooming sizes, so I now (Spring 2022) have two Gordon's Gold blooming this year.

It's exciting when you see your Hoya forming flower buds and it's even worse when you see your Amorphophallus doing that because it takes around 7 - 10 years for this plant to bloom and it may take the same amount of waiting for it to bloom again.

Hoya skinneriana 'Dee's big one'

Hoya skinneriana "Dee's big one" "DD's Big One"

I got this plant as a fresh cutting labeled Hoya pubicalyx 'Red Button' on 2016.It was not a fast grower, but the growth was steady and bloomed for me on 2019, 3years from cutting. That's when I found out that the plant is actually not Hoya pubicalyx, but a Hoya skinneriana. Flowers are much bigger than pubicalyx and leaves look like big pointy carnosa leaves. The flowers will last 7 days outdoors under a tree where it gets direct morning sunlight but will last up to 3 weeks inside the greenhouse. This is a great plant for beginners.

It got too big for its trellis so I decided to take several clones from the plant in the spring of 2019 to start another plant which I then called "The daughter plant". I planted all 10 clones in a 11" pot.

The daughter plant has grown faster than the mother plant ever did! Not only did it grow super fast, but also produced peduncles in only 8 months from cutting during fall 2020. I then decided to take some cuttings from the daughter plant in the early spring of 2021 just to see if her clones will be just as fast growers and just as early bloomers as the daughter plant. I called all the clones "The granddaughter plant" making the original plant "The grandmother plant".

I was happy that The grand daughter plant rooted really fast and already producing peduncles 9 months later. She is now the mother of all the rooted starters that we sell on our website sunnyjenni.com. Although the grandmother plant took a long time to bloom, it never stopped blooming since then. She had been growing and blooming all year round since 2019!

The grandmother plant below.

Back in the 70's, a grower named several NOID Hoya plants with the word "one" in their name. There was "Little One", "Sweet One", "Pink One", and half a dozen others. Everyone just assumed that "Dee's (or DD's) Big One" was part of that group...but then it turns out it was NOT.

Christine Burton states the following in an old issue of The Hoyan.

"I corresponded with Genevieve McDonald for a short time before her death, when she was a member of HSI. She told me that all of those “Ones” – Bright One, Cream One, Dapple Gray, Pink One, Pretty One, Sweet One, Little One, Little Star, Red Buttons, and Gold Star were her seedlings. Dee's Big One is not one of this group. She said she did not know the parentage of them but all were grown from seeds found on the hoyas growing in her yard on Merritts Island, Florida. Dee's Big One was named after Dorothy Skinner of Modesto CA, (Dee is probably Dorothy's nickname?) and was said to have come into the trade from Randy Bachmann's San Luis Gardens, Florida. For all that she knew they were either self-pollinated seedlings or hybrids."

Incidentally, in 2011, the plant called 'DD's Big One' has now its own species. It has been described as H. skinneriana by Kloppenburg and Wayman in 'Fraterna' Oct. 2011.

Also, Kloppenburg was not 100% confident that it originated from San Luis Gardens. It sounds like there's a lack of incontrovertible evidence. It's still a bit of a mystery.

Rice Cactus

Rice Cactus

Mistletoe Cactus

Coral Cactus
Epiphytic Cactus

Rhipsalis Cereuscula

I got this plant from my awesome Filipina friend Joyce. She is always a sunshine wherever she goes or she is. All that positive energy she has is contagious. The perma-smile and laughing all the time (loudly sometimes!!!) make her the star of the show wherever she is without even trying. She used to live in Taos, NM with his equally lovely partner Miles (also with a perma-smile. I told you, Joyce is contagious). Miles is a talented artist I heard and I wish I got to know him better their move. Miles is actually the owner of the plants I inherited before their move to Hawaii, not Joyce😁 and this Rice cactus is one of the uncommon plants Joyce and Miles gave me before they left.

Now, back to the Rice cactus plant!

This is a very unique looking plant.
Looks like a miniature Cholla, but the spines are not prickly.
The spines are very soft to touch you do not need any protection to handle this plant. There is o need for tongs or leather gloves.
The light green stems usually grow up to 3’ feet long when matured with small rice-shaped joints. Yes, rice shaped!!

They do look like unhusked rice grains to me. Another plant that reminds me of home (Asia).😍
This plant produces beautiful white flowers when matured.

The small shrub is indigenous to the tropical rainforests of Central and South America and is commonly found in Argentina, Brazil, and Uruguay.
Surprisingly, growing Rhipsalis requires shade to partial shade and moisture even though it is called a cactus.

While most cacti are found in hot, sunny, arid desert zones,
mistletoe cactus or Rice cactus is unique in its requirements for moisture and dim light.

For a plant that has the word cactus on it's name, this 'cactus' needs water and NO desert full sun please! Only dim light or shade to partial shade to make it happy and alive.

I fertilize the cactus once every four weeks in spring and summer with a half strength balanced liquid 10-10-10 fertilizer.
These plants are found clinging to tree crotches, in branch nooks, and nestled in rock crevasses. The Rhipsalis mistletoe cactus is easy to grow and has very minimal needs. It is perfect for the home interior in a northern or western window and even a terrarium garden.

Growing medium:
I grow mine in coconut coir + regular potting mix + perlite or coconut husk chunks/chips.

The coconut coir holds water at the same time keep the medium aerated because coconut coir does not compact every time you water. Perlite and potting soil/mix do compact in every watering that results to bad aeration overtime and usually the reason for root rot for rainforest plants and to most aroids.