Growing Violets Is Easy?
By Susan Gimblet
I have been very fortunate in my efforts to grow African violets. For years I had a wonderful growing area created from a garage turned solarium. The conditions of light, temperature, humidity and air circulation seemed to all come together and allow me to grow prize-winning violets.
What a difference a move can make! I have been in my new home for 2 years and I am still experimenting trying to get it right!
My growing conditions, particularly in the winter, are cooler. The violets grow on light stands in a finished walk out basement. I no longer have the benefit of passive solar heat to assist in keeping the violets in a warmer environment. The room is fitted with three sections of electric baseboard. To avoid blowing the budget, I have tried to keep the temperature reasonable.
The lights are the same, one warm white and one cool white for each shelf, set for 10 hours a day. The fertilizer routine is the same. Week 1: 20-20-20; week 2: Bounty and Sturdy, and week 3: plain water. The water is different. Previously, water saved from a dehumidifier was used. Now tap water, drawn and allowed to sit for a minimum of a week is utilized.
The first summer and winter, the plant stands were located against a long interior wall, near two of the baseboard heat sections. The violets seemed to do well and I had several show quality plants for the spring show. After the show, I began to notice the variegated plants. The new growth had very little green. The new leaves were predominantly white! I moved the variegated plants from their regular location on the lower shelf up to the top shelf of the plant stands. Over the following months, the new growth on the variegated plants returned to ‘normal’. Of course, now we were in the warmer summer months. During the second winter, the variegated plants remained on either the top or second shelf. There has not been a repeat of the loss of variegation. This summer the variegated plants are back on the lower shelves.
Last summer, I decided to rearrange the furniture in this plant room area. The two light stands were moved into an area approximately six feet by eight feet enclosed on three sides. One stand was still against an interior wall, but the second stand was against an exterior wall. There was one smaller baseboard heat unit. All seemed OK. The violets looked fine and I left in February for a month. Toward the end of the month, I heard from the plant waterer that 3 violets had powdery mildew on the leaves. She isolated them until my return. In the weeks after I returned, I sprayed the violets with a Safer commercial product designed for mildew. Unfortunately, between the mildew and some damage from the fungicide, I had two plants suitable for the spring show!
I purchased a fan to circulate the air, culled out some plants and checked the violets to be sure they were not getting too wet. I read a suggestion by Sue Gardner in the July/August 2008 issue of the AVM She suggested spraying the violets with a solution of two teaspoons of chlorine bleach to one pint of hot water. This spray seems to have worked.
My upcoming plans for the winter include:
To move the light stands back to their previous location closer to the larger baseboard heat units.
To spray the violets again with the bleach solution
To maintain adequate air circulation both with a fan and by separating the violets as much as possible.
To place the variegated plants on upper shelves
To increase the heat in the plant area by a few degrees
I hope that this plan will get my violets back to prize-winning status.
