Wondering if anybody here could help shed some light on a problem I've been having. You know what it is from the title: over and over, I will have a Hoya that does fine, even great, for years, and then suddenly all the leaves go yellow and the stem dries up and the whole thing falls to pieces. Often the plant pulls out of the soil at some point in there too. I'm asking because it's happening right now (H. lacunosa), but it's happened before with: H. carnosa 'Krimson Queen' (sudden decline after three years, then slow decline for about a year), H. pubicalyx (sudden decline and death after 3 years), H. 'DS-70' (sudden decline and death after 13 months), H. 'DS-70' (sudden decline and death after 16 months), H. polyneura (sudden decline after about 18 months, then another six months of little or no recovery) H. carnosa 'Krimson Queen' (sudden decline after nearly 6 years) H. carnosa 'Krimson Princess' (sudden decline after 6+ years) H. lacunosa (currently undergoing a sudden decline, after doing very well for about 4.5 years) Of the above eight cases, five happened in December. (The other three were in July, July, and September.) Based on the timing and the symptoms, I'm thinking some kind of root rot, but it's not like I'm doing anything differently: I'm letting them get as dry as usual before watering, I haven't repotted or topdressed, and the temperature changes very little from season to season here. (We actually work really hard to keep it steady year-round.) Would they just spontaneously commit suicide? Are they naturally not very long-lived plants? It's frustrating, because I like Hoyas quite a bit, but if I can't figure out what's causing SHDS, I'm just going to have to stop trying to grow them. Any ideas?
Definitely too young to die. I have a Hoya carnosa for at least 13 years and it is doing as usual. Like you, I water once a week and have never re-potted it. It lives in a very little pot, very close to the N-W facing window. Unlike you, I keep it in room temperature, which in winter I have set at 15 C (it must be lower close to the window) and in the summer can be quite hot. I use a few drops of liquid Schultz indoor plant fertilizer per one litre of water to water my plants. I think, maybe yours don't like the year round steady temperature?
Could be. But why would those temperatures be okay for four years and then not be okay in the fifth? And does this mean that in order to make the H. lacunosa stop rotting (or whatever), I should put it someplace colder? 'Cause that seems really counter-intuitive. I can think of two Hoyas that are fairly close to windows, and consequently might be getting cooler winters. And they're both doing great, so it's possible that seasonal temperature swings are more necessary than I'd previously believed. But then, I hate to read too much into that, because all the Hoyas do great right up until the point where they fall apart: I can't tell a difference between the plants that are genuinely fine and the plants that are going to implode in three months.
Hmm my hoya is at least 40 years old it was my great grandmothers, and my grampa left it for me. It had lived in the south okanagan in a south facing window for a very long time, now its at the coast with me in a corner of a south facing window with 3 grow lamps around it (keep my orchids keiki growing). I have had a bit of the problem you mentioned I re-potted it with a better draining soil but kept it in the same pot and that seemed to stop the problem. I'd say maybe you over water? I am always surprised that just by misting it with my orchids keeps it happy and put out 8 new leaves this month. Still no blooms after moving to the coast.
