The meeting....

The "Boys in Pink" attended the January meeting on Saturday the 20th. There was plenty of discussion, including information about the upcoming show in March. Everyone, get some entries ready so that Northtown will be filled with lots of "violet" color and charm.

Eight weeks to go and counting!!! Contact the blog if you have questions or need some help or encouragement with your entries!

Talk About Trailers!

Our last couple of posts have been about entering your plants in a show! Well, what about trailers? They're a little different from a "standard" violet. What do you have to consider with a plant that has so many crowns and does not lay in a nice rosette of leaves?

Here are some pointers from someone that knows how to "take home the blue" in the 'trailers' class!

One of the greatest things about growing/showing a African violet trailer is that if you have a bad leaf for two, it usually won't affect the symmetry of the plant. If you have a bad leaf on a standard, you either take a chance on loosing points for symmetry or you have to take off a whole row of leaves. You do need to watch to see that the leaves on a trailer are somewhat the same size, for it gives a more consistent appearance. If you remove yellow and damaged leaves as you see them, you have a better chance that it will fill in the gaps with fresh new leaves before the show.

You need to remember when growing trailers that you must have at least 3 crowns. To get a good number of trailer stems you need more light to encourage more compact growth! This will also help to get more flowers. It is best to have an even distribution of flowers on all the main crowns for the show. Before you show a trailer, make sure you remove all the old or yellow leaves and/or bare stems.

I try to disbud my trailers just as I do other African violet plants. It can sometimes be more challenging to keep it disbudded, but well worth it at show time if you have a well grown trailer with lots and lots of beautiful flowers!

Special thanks to C. S. for today's article and to S. O. for the lovely picture of "Spunky Trail"

Entering Your Plant in a Show, part 2

The show is getting closer, the plants are getting more lovely, NOW WHAT? Well, let's first review what we've done so far before we proceed. First, we checked out all our plants! We looked for good symmetry where the leaves are overlapping nicely, leaving no gaps for the soil and pot to show through. We made sure the plants were reasonably clean and in good overall condition. The plants are potted in an appropriately sized pot. And, with the schedule in mind, we've made a list of all the plants that we intend to keep working with and getting ready for the show.

Our photo shows a great potential show plant! It's got great symmetry, it's clean and in the right size pot.... there may only be a few older leaves in the outer row that we should think about removing.


Good so far! What's next?

I always am checking plants for suckers, which are little plants usually at the base, and I remove them immediately. If a plant has a sucker in a show, judges can eliminate the plant from judging it. It would be a shame to have a beautiful plant and not receive a ribbon simply because of a sucker.

Our picture shows a "sucker" or a new baby plant growing out of the center. Note the two smaller leaves under the larger ones at the base of the stem.

I will also consider whether to enter a plant that has a real thick flower stalk. After a plant with a thick stalk blooms it will distort the center leaves so the plant will need a year or two for the middle leaves to grow out to the outer edge of the plant because they will be marred. Speaking of marred leaves, do not hesitate in entering a plant with a marred leaf or a couple of marred leaves. Only one point is deducted for each marred leaf!

Thinking of points being deducted from your plant, did you know that you can have many small imperfections and still get a blue ribbon? Up to 10 points can be taken off before the plant receives a red ribbon. That's a lot of marred leaves! So why worry if your plant isn't perfect? Don't be afraid to enter it anyway.

About the last week before a show, if a plant is starting to be in full bloom, I will move it to a cooler spot to slow it down a little, or visa versa if it isn't blooming enough. Basically, you should have 20-25 blooms for a large standard, 10-20 for a semi, and 6-12 for a mini. However, if you are a blossom short, enter it anyhow. Not that many points will be deducted.

Beginners will sometimes want to leave on spent blossoms but you can loose mega points (1/2 point per spent blossom) for doing that. I remove blossoms if they are even starting to fade because malls are hard on plants. There are cold drafts and dry air and the blossoms tend to fade more quickly there.

Our photo is showing a blossom that is getting brown edges. The flower is all but spent and although a pretty color, it should be removed.

Before I email my list to the entry person, I review each plant to make sure that it looks like the description in First Class. Is it variegated, a semi, a mini, does it have an edge, is it the right color, etc.? If you don't have the First Class program, don't know what some of the terms like "an edge" means, or have any questions on how to enter a plant, call one of the Sr. members (please don't call us old) for help.

So all you novices, my advice is to try it. Enter the show! It's scary and confusing at times, but remember every single grower in the show went through the novice stage of entering shows. It's not a requirement to enter in that class, but it's a class that the judges will look at the plant a little gentler and may make more comments on the entry tags. The comments are a great way to find out how to make adjustments and grow an even more lovely plant next time. Never, but never, try to guess what a judge sees. Remember, they only look at a plant for maybe a minute and may not even see a problem.

A large THANK YOU to Sharon Johnson for sharing this article.

Entering You Plant in a Show, part 1

Entering plants in a show is the fun part of growing African violets. Maybe you bought a leaf grew it out and now it is a fully-grown plant, or maybe you purchased a small plant and now it is large enough to show the world all its beauty. Now what exactly do you do?

What should you look for right now, with a month or more till the show? Check all of your plants to see which ones might make a good entry in a show. How do you know? What do you look for? The foliage should lay straight out from the center of the plant to the edge of the outer leaves. Each row should overlap the row below without gaps or spaces in the rows or between the individual leaves in a row. Preliminarily grooming the plants for a show is very important too and actually is quite easy. You want to take care of most of the large grooming chores at this point. Most beginners hate to remove leaves, even the baby ones and the yellow ones. But nice symmetry is important so when in doubt, remove them! If there is dust or hair on the leaves, use a soft facial brush and gently sweep it away. Better to do these things now than when there is a chance of ruining a leaf right before the show.

This photo shows some of the larger problems you'll want to deal with. There is cat hair on the leaves to the left. Use a make-up brush and gently remove it, or better yet give the plant a bath in tepid water. The red flag shows us a huge potential problem! The plant is in full bloom more than a month before the show. Those flowers should have been removed prior to now so that the plant has fresh blooms for the show! The blue flag shows a folded, broken leaf. Remove that and the one marked with purple. That one is ripped. The yellow flag shows baby (tiny) leaves in the outer rows. It's best to remove them now so that the rest of the mature leaves will fill in the voids.

When I am first deciding which plants to enter, I review each plant as a possible entry. If it is less than 8" in diameter and it is a standard plant, I do not consider entering it because it needs to grow up a few more months. If you are entering a semi it should not be more than 8" in diameter and a mini can't be more than 6" in diameter. If the plant is just a bit too large the outer row of leaves can be removed to help keep the plant in its proper category. The size of the pot doesn't matter for semis or minis, but the standard's leaf span should be 3x (times) the diameter of the pot. If I do have to repot a plant, I never repot a plant until the 4^th week before a show. If I do it earlier, the plant will not be root-bound and may not bloom.

This photo shows us that some plants just need more time to grow. Picking the proper sized pot is necessary but very easy!

After I've decided on which plants to enter in a show, I write out a list and for the time being I ignore the schedule which describes all the classes and sections. At this point don't worry about entering more than one plant in a class.

This photo shows our volunteer contemplating all the different classes she'll be entering her plants in. She's holding the schedule which is good to have handy even all these weeks before the show! It's helpful to know what the designs will be so that you have time to plan for them!

The next part of "Entering Your Plant in a Show" will review what to do a little closer to the show! Stay tuned.

Intergeneric Crossing

We have a special entry for you today!!! When I got the new issue of African Violet, I happened to turn to Dr. Smith's column about breeding new violets. The first question on the page is one that I've wondered about since I got interested in violets. Can you cross a Saintpaulia with any of the other gesneriads??? His answer is informative and interesting (page 6 of the new Jan/Feb AV) but made to fit the limited space of the Q&A format. I had more questions. I kept wondering about trying to cross a violet with streptocarpus or a sinningia and then I got a bit of inspiration..... ask some people who would know!

I wrote to Dale Martens who has made some fantastic intergeneric crosses! (Click on the link.) She is the co-author of Crosswords, a publication for hybridizers, and she was the featured speaker at a half-day seminar put on by the AGGSTC, the local gesneriad club, in September of 2005. In addition, Dale is one of the nicest people you could want to meet! When I wrote to her with my questions for the blog she immediately took the time to answer... Here is her reply!

"For those new to intergenerics, streptocarpus is a genus and Saintpaulia is a genus (with a common name of African violets). If you cross two different genera (plural for genus) you have an intergeneric. Which gesneriads make the best candidates for hybridizing: Ones that have the same number of chromosomes so they match. How do you find out the number of chromosomes? Research! I believe sinningia is aroudn 26 and streptocarpus is 32, but could be wrong. One must put an "x" in front of the intergeneric's name which is a combination of both genera. I have crossed achimenes x smithiantha to get xAchimenantha, and Phinaea x Diastema to get xPhinastema, and smithiantha x eucodonia to get xSmithicodonia. The closest genera to Saintpaulia is streptocarpus, but genetically not just any streptocarpus. Studies seem to indicate that the evolution of Saintpaulia is from the Streptocarpus subgenus Streptocarpella.

Streptocarpellas are stemmed and branching streptocarpus with fuzzy leaves. A common one is Streptocarpella 'Blueberries and Cream'. Some of us have tried crossing streptocarpella x saintpaulia. The most likely person to succeed probably needs to cross a species AV with a species streptocarpella that lives near it (within miles) in Africa in nature. Therefore, it'd take some research to find which ones live close to each other. I have tried crossing species AVs with all sorts of other gesneriads including Petrocosmea since to me it's most similar. But Petrocosmeas live in Asia, so it's quite unlikely to cross with an AV."

Again, a special "Thank You!" to Dale for taking the time to reply! Hopefully, even more will follow about the intergeneric hybridizing of gesneriads and more specifics on the Saintpaulia genus.

JANUARY MEETING!!!

Attention Everyone! The next meeting of the NSAVC is on January 20th at 1:00 pm. All club members are invited as well as anyone wishing to visit or join us. Club members check your email for meeting location and directions. Anyone else can contact the address on the blog for further information. ( nsavctc@gmail.com )

The program will be about going "Back to the Basics!" This is a fun way to start off the year with your plants. This month's hosts have a very lovely growing environment and are happy to share tips and pointers with everyone! There are tasty treats served too! So please mark off next Saturday and be sure to attend. The club really needs YOU!
Flamingo tested. Flamingo approved!

Helpful Hints!

Well, I just finished a marathon repotting secession today. As usual, with the holidays, December repotting was completely neglected. So that meant both December and January needed to be done quickly before February came sneaking around the corner. The repotting prompted me to share with you some ideas that help me im my plant room.


There are a number of reasons your African violet could end up without roots. It may have developed a long neck or multiple crowns and needed to be broken down. I have always had good luck with planting the AV in a small pot and covering it with an inside-out zip-lock baggie. This forms a mini-greenhouse. After a couple of months check to confirm the plant is solidly rooted and remove the baggie. I will also do this if the root system seems to be a bit weak and want to be sure that the AV has sufficient moisture.

Using reservoirs is a great time saver for watering your plants. Plus, wicking can let you go for a couple weeks without worrying about them drying out. However, mineral build-ups and algae are a royal pain to clean. I line my reservoirs with white or clear plastic bags, add some water, press on the lid and then trim the excess bag. Be sure that the bags you use are completely waterproof. Many of the food bags and shopping bags are very thin and will ultimately seep. I use garbage bags and cut them to fit the reservoirs.

I usually have one or two trays of leaves at various stages of rooting or showing plantlets. However, sometimes space or time is not available to start a whole new tray. Put a couple tablespoons of whatever you use for a root starter mix in the corner of a sandwich size baggie. Prepare your leaves as usual, close the bag enough, but not necessarily air tight. I use a clothespin and clip them to my light fixtures. They can also be pinned to your curtains or any inventive way to have them near a light source. Check occasionally to be sure the medium is moist, but not too wet.

Thanks to Barb Werness for both the article and the great photos!

Ordering Leaves the New Way!

I have been ordering leaves from the commercial growers since the early 80's. When I received the African Violet magazine I would send post cards to the businesses that advertised requesting their catalogues. Upon their arrival I would look over the lists of plants and spend hours and hours imaging what the flowers looked like. Finally, I would make a final decision and then I'd send in my order only to have it be shipped to me in May when it warmed up enough for them to send the plants without harming the leaves.

Yes, times have changed since then with the internet. Now days I go online, make my decisions, order them using a credit card and have them shipped Federal Express!

I believe I am getting plants that I'll like since I can see the pictures of the flowers. Although, sometimes my vision was not quite what it should have been. Quite often the commercial vendors will have pictures of the plants listed for sale. If they don't have a picture, I'll look in First Class and at other commercial vendor's listings. Hopefully, a picture of the foliage will also be shown because not only is the flower important, but so is the foliage. I particularly like plants with shiny dark leaves, which are large growing and have a contrast between the leaves and flowers, especially the variegated ones.

I also like them registered by the AVSA since it is my belief that registered plants are the best of the hybirdizer's "crop". Also, I like to enter in the Registered classes of our shows and it is required that the violets be registered.

However, if I like the plants from a particular hybridizer and if someone has them for sale and they aren't registered, I'll still order them. Sometimes they won't get around to registering them till later, and then I wished I had ordered them. Sometimes they are just not a good show plant!

I find it fun to grow a plant from a leaf into a beautiful show plant. There is less chance of having diseases or bugs and the growth pattern stays consistent since the plant has not had a change of environment or soil while it was growing to maturity.

Another reason I switched from the old style-ordering with all the waiting for the leaves to be delivered months later to the rather "instant" online ordering is that there are less substitutions. And, if I get plants in the winter months, they always seem larger than ones mailed in the spring. It also keeps me busy during our long winters although I actually miss the anticipation of a box or catalog arriving unexpectedly. Of course, there is a slight difference in the shipping costs when cold-weather ordering but I think the benefits outweigh the expenses. Besides, I bet the postcards cost more now too!

Thanks to Sharon Johnson for this article!

Chemical Factors Affecting Germination and Seedling Growth

The gesneriphiles@lists.ibiblio.org list yesterday posted an interesting comment that made me think of something that I've been wondering about for quite some time now. I hope you will find this line of thought (although a little long) worth pondering too.

In a posted conversation discussing the seeding of gesneriad and African violet seeds, comments were made about the effects of moving new seedlings as a way of either increasing their growth or stimulating further germination of other seeds that were sown, but hadn't germinated yet. Karen C. stated "Another reason for gently taking seedlings out of the pot when they are small is this leaves room for a possible 2nd set of germination from the seed. I’ve found this happens more often with species than with hybrids and I think it is natures way of making sure that if the first batch of seedling die off that the conditions may allow the 2nd batch to succeed." This remark about species seeds and nature providing a method of ensuring germination if something should cause the first seedlings to fail prompted me to think of a couple more comments that relate to gesneriad young and our interaction with them as home hobbyists.

Dale Martens has commented that a sure way to get a new seedling to grow faster is to "disturb" them. She moves/removes the seedlings from their pot and resets them every couple of weeks. At first people were skeptical, but many have shared the usefulness of this technique as really working well for them. I recall some speculation as to why this would work. Perhaps it was some sort of "stress" reaction by the plant. If it felt disturbed it put out more of something, perhaps hormones or growth regulators, to speed rooting and growth to ensure the plant's survival after disruption. Again, a plant reacting to conditions to ensure continued survival.

I was also talking to a fellow grower about growing streptocarpus. She said that she brushed up against the leaves and moved them occasionally like they might move if they were in the wind outdoors. She was quite satisfied with bothering to take time to do this because it seemed to produce stronger, healthier leaves. Yet another plant reaction to environmental conditions?

These three somewhat different lines of thought regarding the improved growth in rate and vigor of gesneriad young may all be connected. Why would moving plant material, be it seed, seedling or young affect growth?

A quote from the Annals of Botany states "The vertical distribution of seeds in sand determines the proportion of seeds that germinate after precipitation and acts to maintain seed banks over multiple years." I take this to mean that something about the position in the soil makes the seed either germinate or not as conditions change. Like the comment about the species gesneriad seed. When removing some of the seedlings a whole second set of seedlings might be produced. Are there chemical inhibitors produced by the germinating seedlings that stop other seeds (from either the same species or different ones) from growing? Is it an environmental condition such as position in the soil that makes the difference?

From the Florida Cooperative Extension Services document HS944 "Allelopathy refers to the beneficial or harmful effects of one plant on another plant, both crop and weed species, by the release of chemicals from plant parts by leaching, root exudation, volatilization, residue decomposition and other processes in both natural and agricultural systems." They go on to further state that different plant parts, not only the roots can produce chemical agents to affect growth.

Allelopathy is usually studied to determine the negative effects one plant reacting to the presence of another, but for our purposes what if there are beneficial compounds that are present when gesneriads experience movement. (Either by their roots in the soil or by the stems and leaves.) The folks at the Florida Extension Service are mainly talking about using one plant as a potential inhibitor for another, but for our discussion their points about the plant's ability to produce compounds to enhance growth is what is interesting to me. Can we as gesneriad growers learn anything useful from their observations? The publication went on to summarize the point much better that I could: "Furthermore, physiological and environmental stresses, pests and diseases, solar radiation, herbicides, and less than optimal nutrient, moisture, and temperature levels can also affect allelopathic weed suppression. Different plant parts, including flowers, leaves, leaf litter and leaf mulch, stems, bark, roots, soil and soil leachates and their derived compounds, can have allelopathic activity that varies over a growing season. Allelopathic chemicals can also persist in soil, affecting both neighboring plants as well as those planted in succession."

In conclusion, wouldn't it be interesting to see what was going on with the gesnerial seed and young from a chemical point of view? If we could locate what the plant produced naturally could we seriously speed up production of the plants that we enjoy keeping in our homes? Could identifying these particular growth regulators have any other interesting applications in relation to the home hobbyist?

Sources that were used: The comments about soil distribution: Annals of Botany 2005 95(4):649-659; doi:10.1093/aob/mci060

^{The comments about allelpathic activity are from:} 1. This document is HS944, one of a series of the Horticultural Sciences Department, Florida Cooperative Extension Service, Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences, University of Florida. Publication date: July 2003. Please visit the EDIS Web site at http://edis.ifas.ufl.edu.

2. James J. Ferguson, professor, Bala Rathinasabapathi, associate professor, Horticultural Sciences Department, Cooperative Extension Service, Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences, University of Florida, Gainesville, 32611.

Growing Disasters

Growing African violets is a lot different than playing an instrument. If you play an instrument and hit a wrong note you will instantly know you did something wrong. If you change something when growing African Violets it takes about 3 months until you'll see a change in the plant.

I have grown plants for many, many years and I have had a few experiences that I wish I had not had. When I hear of doing something different and it sounds like a good idea, I'll try it!

So, what are some things I've done? As a new grower many years ago, I heard about a product I thought sounded good. I ordered it and tried it on a tray of 30 leaves that I had just purchased. The leaves withered and died 3 days later. Yessiree, all 30 of them!

Then I heard about the fine attributes of using cow manure in a growing mixture. My plants grew to a nice size and I was pleased with the results. One very cold day, rather than go into the garage to get a mix for the minis, I used the cow manure mixture. It took about 3 months until they started to grow into huge plants. None of them could be put in a show because they were too large.

Superthrive was supposed to be a nice additive and I used it on all my plants. I was happy with the shiny leaves. However, all the variegated plants turned much greener and once again I could not enter them in a show. I've continued using Superthrive and it is o.k. as long as I continue using it. The variegation stays nice but if I were to discontinue using it the variegation would then be lighter in color.

I also heard of a product to control or stop powdery mildew. It seemed to work until I noticed that 3 months later all the plants had markings on their leaves. I have since heard that the product must be mixed and used immediately. It cannot stand for a few days and then be used without bad results. Once again many plants could not be entered in a show.

A few years ago, foliar feeding seemed to be a good thing to do. Of course, I did it but no matter how careful I was wiping the edge of the leaf of any excess moisture, I still got burned edges. More plants not entered in a show! Since the idea came about, experiments have been done to show that the plants do not benefit from fertilizer placed on the leaves.

Many books and articles talk about alternating fertilizers. Yup, did that too. More plants not entered in a show. It probably is a good idea since different fertilizers contain different elements but it should be done all the time. Rather than alternating, I stay with one fertilizer. It saves me wondering what I used last week and what I should use this week.

So what is my advice to prevent such disasters? Try new ideas or products but do it on only three plants for 3 months. I try to select a plant with a light green leaves, a plant with a dark green leaves, and a variegated plant for the experiment and then I wait…………..

Thank you to our author - judge, teacher, grower and willing mentor for those of us still learning - Sharon Johnson!