New Zealand Garden Swap Newsletter

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Standards
The Usual Size

Miniatures
Every bit as beautiful but on a smaller scale

Chimeras
Pinwheel Blooms

Chiritas
Natives of China.

Bathing a violet

Make sure the water is not too hot or too cold. It should be approximately the same temperature as a babies bath.
Let the warm water run over each outside leaf, cleaning all the dust from the surface.
Rotate the plant as illustrated without letting water get into the crown of the plant. If an accident does happen don't panic, just clean it up. Q-tips or paper toweling rolled to a sharp peak is great for soaking up the water and finish off with a couple of hard blows to the center of the plant. I mean blow on the center of your plant to dry it.

Watering

I am now mainly into wick watering, but when manually watering I would alternate from top to bottom. I never did see much difference in either! Of most importance is the build up of salts from fertilizers and such, be leeched out regularly. You can arrange a nice tray, or water proof basket with a layer of gravel, use enough gravel to to sit the pots up out of the water, and let the wicks do the rest. This serves two purposes, humidity around your violet and it is now self watering. You just do your job and keep the reservoir full.

Leeching

I think it is important I say here you do not leech a newly potted plant, nor one you have just started (baby) Leeching is used to postpone repotting an african violet and is not intended to be part of a regular routine. African Violets breathe a lot of air through their root systems. Just as the walls in your home gather dirt, grime and grease from cooking odors so do your plants. Also fertilizer salts eventually build up and the root ball will give off a very distinct ammonia odor when watered. I use 1 drop of soap (dishwashing liquid, obviously we do not want a soap that is especially kind to the hands here, we are trying to cleanse, not add to the problem) to 1 litre of water to flush the violets. You may be able to get away with a couple (6 to 8 weeks apart) of leechings before repotting your plant. I believe the proper term is leeching. I water from the top with soapy water, until the water runs through the soil, then sure that the soapy water is right through the plant, I rinse with warm clear until the water coming out the bottom of the pot looks clear enough to drink. Obviously it would be very wrong to leech a plant that does not need a watering, if it is not ready yet... wait, until next watering.

Violets can go a great while looking fantastic, and then overnight seem to just let go, develop mushy stems, collapse and appear to be rotting. The distraught owner would insist the plant had been treated the same as always and couldn't understand what went wrong! MY answer to this? Your violet should not have been treated the same as always, it should have been leeched or potted up with fresh soil somewhere along the line, well before it got to this "collapse" point. In actual fact the problem started a good while back and could have been prevented by a leeching or potting in fresh soil. Now the only hope for this plant is that it has a leaf or two still firm enough to root. Toss the rest of it. The most important thing is that you have a couple of good leaves to start anew, and a lesson learned.

Starting Leaves

I have tried many of the written methods and had some success, but never as well as just relax and have fun with it. The more I worried, the less the violet thrived. I loved them to death!

NOTE: recent findings...
I have noticed that rooting powder actually takes longer to make babies. The leaves do root faster but they concentrate on making roots more than making babies. Now I just push the leaf into the vermiculite just to cover the cut end and keep very wet. You will have to prop them and be very careful not to jostle them but I think it is worth it in the waiting time. Also worth noting here leaving long stems is not necessary. With the longer stem I tended to push the leaf farther down in to the rooting medium, which of course adds to the time it takes to see the babies emerge.

Now I find a tray (the plastic salad take-out trays work just fine) use a hot needle to burn a bunch of holes in the bottom, fill it with coarse vermiculite, packed quite firmly WHILE DRY, add water and let sit. Take your leaf cut it on an angle at the front, poke a hole in the moist vermiculite with a pen. usually the leaf you are working with is strong enough to push into the vermiculite at this point, but if you do not want to take chances, use the pen, insert the leaf, prop it against a popsicle stick at a bit of a right angle. Firm very lightly around the base of the leaf and by watering again. Be very careful not to pack your vermiculite. I do not cover my leaves.

I set them on the top shelf of the light garden and don't worry about them. Of course most important to this method is lots of water! I have mine sitting in about an inch of water at all times until the babies begin to show. I am sure this is why I do not have to cover mine. With this method I can boast a high percentage success rate on my leaf starts. Perhaps it is because it is carefree! Covering the violet you must be right on the ball as to weather there is too much condensation on the baggie etc... I have also found an equal mixture of coarse vermiculite, perlite and fine peat moss works well too as a starting mixture! The mixture must be light whatever you choose, and remember do not pack while wet!

A broken leaf??? No problem! I have cut them into pie shaped wedges and had great success in rooting them! Most people though will use the shaping at the right. It has happened that during one of my frequent absences one "Midnight Magic" leaf gave up and fell over. It was my last chance at saving that leaf, and I discovered the stem was hard and brown but the tip of the leaf laying on the soil gave some resistance when I tried to pick it up. I nursed that tiny "tip" but now I have two beautiful plants! I no longer give up on a leaf if I can find the tiniest bit of green on it. here are some new babies just peeking through the soil pop them out of the pot when they are big enough to handle. You will easily see where to separate them. When the babies are large enough to separate and be potted up use the 2-1/4" pots, pot them up and care for them as you would a plant. I like to use my teaspoon of vermiculite in the center of the pot just to give these little fella's a rootin' chance. I explain this in more detail below. Their roots quickly take over the vermiculite and spread out into the soil beyond.

Rooting and Starting Suckers

You will find young plants tend to "sucker" in the first year or so. Some are worse for this than others. Take advantage of them ..... they are another plant for your collection!

Prepare a 2-1/2" pot with your potting medium. Scoop out about 1 teaspoon of soil out of the center and fill the resulting space with coarse vermiculite, water thoroughly, set aside. Take the sucker off the main plant as cleanly as possible, then prepare the bottom of the sucker by lightly scraping the outside edge , with your fingernail or sharp knife. Brush lightly with a #1 rooting hormone powder, press sucker in the vermiculite in prepared pot. AND there you go!!! Water thoroughly and keep soil as moist as you would your leaf starts and within just a few days it will be obvious that your "sucker" has taken root. At this time treat as a regular plant. This plant will grow up identical to "mom" and be just as big and beautiful as those grown from leaf. Actually this method is much faster than starting from leaf because you have begun with a plant!