"Dis-buds" for You.

Guess what time of year it is again? Yep, it's BUD time. No, not time to grab a cold one and sit back with the ball game on, it is the time to disbud for the upcoming show which is now 8 weeks away!

If you are grooming many plants for a show it's sometimes hard to look up each and every plant to determine if it's a single or a double. So, to make things relatively simple, you disbud all standard plants at eight weeks. Doubles could be done at 8 weeks and single-bloom plants at 6 weeks, but that can get confusing not to mention time consuming.

It's also a good time to look at the leaf placement and the overall grooming of the plant. You could gently re-align leaves at this time so that they will be in the optimal position by Oct. Seeing that the plant is in good shape and clean now will prevent accidentally knocking off blooms or leaves closer to the show too.

Any questions about getting plants ready for a show???? Contact the blog at nsavctc@gmail.com and experts will be happy to answer your questions and lend a guiding hand for anyone that would like some advice.

It's The Great State Fair!

Time again for the 12 biggest days of summer!!!! Food, fun and FLOWERS!!!

The horticulture building is featuring the African violet show starting today, Thursday August 23, 2007. Lots of violets, gesneriads and design. The AVSM is hosting the show with additional affiliate club tables all featuring lots of beautiful plants!!!

Get on down to the Fair and grab something on a stick before you go and check it out. Bring your camera too!

Everyone Needs One of These!!!

You might be like me and you've definitely noticed that there aren't a lot of books, publications or decent printed materials about growing gesneriads. I might hazard a guess and say that one of the last inclusive books about a good variety of gesneriads was published about thirty years ago in the 1970's. This brand new book looks like it will be a wonderful guide to growing gesneriads and if you read about the offer, they are practically giving them away. What a great deal! Their publication chair has this to say:

The Gesneriad Society is proud to announce the pending publication of
its manual "How to Know and Grow Gesneriads". Publication date is
September 1, 2007. The cover price of "How to Know and Grow
Gesneriads" will be US$10. Quantity discounts will be available.

Thanks to a generous donation from the Frelinghuysen Arboretum
Gesneriad Society, all Gesneriad Society members will receive a copy
in the mail with their 4th Quarter 2007 issue of Gesneriads, to be
mailed in October.

We are offering a special pre-publication price of US$5 until
September 1. That means only the next 10 days. So of you aren't a
Society member, or if you are curious and can't wait until
October/November, or if you want to buy copies for friends, here's
your chance. Go to http://gesneriadsociety.org/Shop/knowandgrow.htm
for more information.

--Peter Shalit, Publications Chair, The Gesneriad Society