1. How long do you leave the stem? (I try to cut them so that the leaf is supported on top of the vermiculate/pearlite mixture and the stem reaches almost to the bottom of the cup)
2. I saw someting about cutting the leaf and putting the cut edge in the starting mix like a Strep cutting how well does it work? If I did this could I plant both halves? (I will probably experiment with this on some NOID leaves)
3. Would it be beneficial to use a weak fertilizer and maybe some Super Thrive in the trays? (I am asking because now I am using plain water) If not when do you begin fertilizing them?
4. When you order leaves do you cut them again before putting them down? (I have been)
I have been doing well starting new plants from leaves, but would like to try and fine tune what I am doing now. I have a bunch going now, but I think they could be growing better. I am using the 3oz dixie cups with 4 holes burned around the bottom in flats without holes. I keep between 1/2 and 3/4 inch of water in the flat, the flat is emptied and cleaned every 2 to 3 weeks (or as needed) with water added as needed. I am seeing new plantlets daily now, and every leaf I have put down has roots.
Leaf starting questions........
I do not have a lot of experience but I'll gladly share the bit I have found. If you cut the stem very long then the babies have a really long way to go to reach the top of the soil and they are thin and weak. If the stems are too short then they will not stay in the soil or the edge of the leaf is in the soil and I am not sure if it will rot but I didn't want to take the chance it might. I have found that I seem to like them about 1 1/4 inches if possible. Smaller than 3/4" is too short and longer than 1 3/4 is too long. Maybe I'm being too fussy about it.
I am trying to learn how to isolate and I do not have much room so for now I am using baggies for each leaf. The benefit is that I do not need to water them but the hard part is getting the water just right because too much and there is all this condensation that gets of the leaf so you need to have just a teensy bit of dampness in the soil.
I don't know if you should cut them again I think I did cut some but not others depending on if the cut was the way I thought they should be or if the stem was the right length.
I read that you could put the leaf in too and I tried it with a leaf that had no stem left. I just tried it last week and it hasn't rooted yet and I'm not sure I even did it right.
Oh one thing I found that helped is not filling the cup to the top. When I would do that the leaf wasn't supported but when I fill it only half way then the leaf is supported by the cup and it's only in the soil a 1/2" or so with a 1/2" of so out of the soil.
I just slant my hole in the perlite with a pencil and leave about 1/2" to 3/4" petiole on the leaf and I always cut them with a razor blade to cut at a slant.........so the babies will pop right up in front of the mother leaf.
If the leaf is a large leaf, be sure and cut 1/3 of the leaf off.........or you will find the mother leaf just growing away and making a long long stem..........and not babies......
All good advice.I am a little concerned they stand in water all of the time.I hope you are using a super lean mix.
Ibrabec, I am using plain water right now, if I was to use fertilizer it would be at half strength or less. The method I am using is one I was directed to by a vendor on ebay. I have not had any rot.
Gail, I didn't know about cutting off 1/3 of the large leaves, I was wondering why I am not seeing babies on any of those yet. I guess I'll have to do that in the net day or two, and I'll try and putting the pieces I cut off down, that will answer some of my questions. They have some really nice roots coming out of the cups. I put them down the same way you do.
Lynn, I am confused. Why are avs standing in water all the time? Did someone say that?
Help me........sometimes I realize my Granny age is getting to me.......(LOL)
I just noticed a leaf that Viostrep put in the last round robbin box............aren't these cool looking babies.......check out the color of the mother leaf and the baby leaves coming up
Cascade by David Senk
got to go to bed!!
Welcome!
It will take your leaf longer to root if it has a long stem to the bottom of the cup. I was told that this, this summer by someone with a lot of experience. Someone had come to her and asked why their leaf was still green (and bigger) but had not grown any baby plants after rooting for several months, and when they took it out of the pot to see what was going on in the pot, her stem went all the way to the bottom of the pot. She was telling was that she had told her - a short stem would have produced plantlets in much less time... And when I first started rooting leaves and left a long stem, it did take longer..I learned to cut it shorter and have faster results.
Yes, re-cut the leaf, leave 1/2 " or less off the stem and at an angle to get more surface to make more plants, I was told a little shorter the better, too short though and it won't stay put. Bill Price who grows wonderful show plants says to wait 15 minutes between when you cut the leaf and when you put it in soil and you will have less chance of rotting. sometimes I wait, sometimes I don't.
Once you cut the leaf off the plant, it will continue to grow while it is trying to root. some people cut the leaf in half so more energy will go into producing roots and making baby plantlets and not so much into growing the leaf. The same with fertilizer, you don't want to feed the leaf, wait until you have plantlets.
That piece you cut off could grow a plantlet, when I've tried it, mostly they rotted. I have had a broken leaf send out roots and grow a plant. I try and put down two leaves if I can in case I lose one. One leaf is really enough...they usually make at least two plantlets, more often 3 or 5 plantlets. Two are fine for me, keep one, give one.
Some people root in water. Others in soil mixture or perlite or vermiculite or a mix of perlite and vermiculite. If you are not rooting in water, you need to keep the soil mix damp, not wet, less water is good, too much will rot the leaves. At a violet club meeting this summer we were talking about the different mixes we used to root leaves....I took some leaves from the same plant (because not all plants take the same amount of time to root) and put them in different mediums to see what will happen, will they start babies at the same time, or grow the same amount of plantlets, etc. They are moasic leaves and I don't know if that will make a difference either. it will be a good show and tell when something starts to happen with them. The only thing, I would have liked to take them out and compare the root system, but I havent' decided if that would be a good idea I may wait until plantlets and check that then.
violetbarn.com has pictures ...go: plant care, then lessons - that might be helpful
Everyone starts new plants a little bit different.
It's fun to grow new violets...before you know it, you will be rooting everything and giving the extras away by the boxful!
Take care, tish
I too have to go to bed I am up late but didn't have a chance earlier to check in. I have seen several of the David Senk violets in fact went to his website or a website about his plants. They are very interesting aren't they?
I have also heard that cutting the top of the leaf if a good idea. I haven't had any very large leaves yet and am not sure why you only cut large leaves and not small leaves too.
I forgot to mention something strange that happened to one of my leaves. I am not sure but maybe it was bent a bit in the baggie but somehow it developed a bit of a vertical crack but it's still connected to the other side. Along the edges of this crack some roots have started to grow! It is rooted in the soil too but I was interested by this and wondering if this could be used in any way to grow more plantlets. Tish I too will be happy with two babies but some people who grow them for other reasons might want lots of babies and maybe a longer length of leaf would do that. OK I have to go to bed I will be very tired when I have to get up at 5 am. Good night everyone.
Tish,
Thank you so much for your post. I learned a lot!
gail
I guess keeping them in flats with water is really no different than rooting them in water, except that they are stuck in a cup of vermiculite and pearlite.
Tish, ditto Gails last post.
I guess cutting the large leaves puts them in the survival mode and causes them to produce plantlets. I did notice that there is a way higher percentage of babies coming on the trailers which have small leaves.
I'll be cutting leaves later, and with the root systems established I would think the babies would come pretty quick. I will probably put down some of the cut pieces to see if it will work. I think I'll do 2 trays and try some rooting hormone on the leaves in one tray. I put down 2 leaves of each so I can split the same types between the 2 trays. I'll probably bag them in ziplocs.
Which brings up another question, I understand the idea of bagging or doming to keep the containers damp, but I don't use covers on the leaves I am starting in the flats with water. Does anyone think it would help speed things up? I know it would slow evaporation.
I don't know if it sped things up here and probably it didn't but I bag them to quarantine them because I don't have another way right now to do it. It was very hard to get the water right but once I did it was so very easy. I put them in once and never water them again until I take them out but it was very easy to overwater and then you get rotting leaves or at least in my experience you do.
I ilike david senk violets,never have grow cascade,might have to try that sometime
JIM
Thanks Tish, I learned a lot too from your post.
Hi all ,
I just wanted to let you know Gail that your Cascade looks exactly as it should , I am glad the leaf I sent you is doing so well , Cascade is one of David Senk's oddiest and pretties plants , the leaves are like rubber and very shinny , it is a wonderful plant and the leaves are supposed to cup just as your pic shows , so glad it is doing so well for you :) I love to know that something I sent to someone is doing so well :) oh and in case you didn't know Cascade is a trailer and is variegated off and on , his plants are very odd as they can look one way at one time and another at other times , I think it has to do with temps maybe but anyway very interesting to grow :)
Hope you are all having a good week :)
Connie
Connie, all the leaves you sent me are making babies and I am beside myself with joy. Thanks for telling me that she is a trailer.......makes a lot of difference when I pot up because I usually cheat and plant 2 or 3 babies to a pot (smiling)...........
Now hear this.........the leaves I got from all my friends are doing great and some leaves from ebay are doing great..........but I did pay over 10.00 each for some from my good friend John Cook as Rhubarb and none of them are making babies. Why? The leaves were too old and from the very bottom of the big standards...........I am going to wait it out and see.........really disappointed...........in such old plant material sent to me at those prices. Black Jack Supreme and Ann neither have any babies...........one leaf of Ann is even dead!!
That was ordered before I found out from Connie and everyone else to always check VioletGallery, Cedarcreek, VioletVenture and other vendors before paying these prices on ebay.............
Glad you are filled with joy Gail :) Hugs to you :) Um I wanted to ask if anyone has rooted just the leaf without the stem , I have done this many times as sometimes a plant get knocked down and you have a leaf without a stem , let see if I can say this so it is understood .........ok you cut the bottom edges of the leaf on both sides to make a V shaped leaf and make a tiny wedge cut at the spot where the stem was broken off so the babies will grow in the front of the leaf and dip it in rooting powder and gentle pot it up and make sure just the leaf point is in the medium and the rest of the leaf is propped up against the pot or a tag / straw etc . you don't want the rest of the leaf on the medium and don't over water and treat just as you do your other leaves which for me is not too much attention , too much love kills , good for people but not for rooting leaves , as they say less is more :) nothing ventured no babies gained and you would throw out the leaf otherwise anyway , kind of like ............................oh please eat all you want , we were going to throw it out otherwise LOL :)
Connie :)
Connie, you said the same thing as me only you made sense out of cutting a petiole for a broken leaf.........I can never say what I mean to say in trying to explain something................
Thank you Gail , taking a bow while smiling LOL .......................it is hard to give a picture with words but i thought I would give it a go so if someone gets a broken leaf in the mail and is brokenhearted to have lost the chance of babies of a plant they really wanted they can still give it a try , in my case yesterday I was moving plants around and i knocked a leaf off of my dear Field and Stream , it had no stem so I just popped it into water and today I potted it up after giving it the V cut and dipping it in rooting powder , this way at least I have tired to use it , even when it is not a leaf that is as precious to me I still like to try just to see if it will root ....................and it usually does :)
Connie :)
ok so where can i see this av called ann?
thanks
JIM
Here is the link to AVSA to see the pic of Ann Jim :)
Connie
http://www.avsa.org/Photographs.asp?Photos=A
I will show you..................and to top it off...........I found an actual plant for 7.00 on Bluebird Violets later.........if this one never sends up babies I will be ordering it from Bluebird.
Ann (6649) 06/01/1987 (B. Bryant) Double rose-pink frilled/two-tone center, edge. Variegated dark green, white, some pink, longifolia, quilted, cupped, glossy, ruffled. Large (TX Hyb)
How funny...........we were posting at the same time (LOL)
I would think with water, you would not need to bag them. When you cut the leaf from the plant, it takes its water source away, so keeping it covered while rooting in soil may give it the extra humidity until it gets roots. My friend put her leaves in a pot of soil mix and never covered them and they did just fine, made lots more plantlets than mine...she had some green thumb! My favorite way to root is using my soil mix in the clear plastic deli containers. I put them in with a label and forget about them for a few weeks.
Being a member of two violet clubs, I guess I picked up a lot of useful information. Glad some of it can help someone. Just remember, there are lots of sources of information and a lot of it contridicts. Best way to know what works for you is to try different things....even if it breaks all the rules... such as avs don't like to be kept too wet, they will rot..however, some people do grow them in water...using the hydrophonics medium. I did try a couple of plants, but I didn't have the results I wanted.
I used to have a lot of David Senk's violets. I liked how they were quirky.
tish
I posted this on the wrong thread.
I will never tell someone how to grow anything as there seems to be a zillion ways to accomplish the same task. Here are two av leaves stuck in my regular mix (which I never do with av leaves) and look how healthy and big the babies are.
Well, Gail, I'm going to move my question over here from the other thread, then. LOL You don't have to answer over on the other one.
I always start my leaves in the same mix I grow in. Seems to work best for me. Do you like that way better or the perlite and vermiculite only way?
I don't know!!!! I have always grown in 1/2 perlite and 1/2 vermiculite for av leaves and that works, too.........so I just don't know!!
I've used plain pearlite, and it works. I like the vermiculite/pearlite mix better though. I get less algae on top of it.
I have an observation . . . When I started leaves in my normal mix, the babies grew just fine. When the same leaves were started in a perlite/vermiculite mix, the babies grew bigger in the same amount of time.
Hi ,
I really appreciate all the input from all of you on this subject , Nicole I have never started leaves in just perlite but have gotten plants from ebay sellers who's plants looked pale and anemic and I just assumed it was because they had been started in perlite but now you all talk about how great leaves root and grow in perlite alone that I have been putting leaves down to see what results i get too so I want to thank you and everyone who has talked about this method or rooting leaves and I am excited to see what shows up in the next few weeks :)
Thank you all again , Hugs :)
Connie
I am still wondering about fertilizing.
I use a mild constant feed for all my plants including my leaves , with and without babies cause to me as soon as the leaf is getting roots it needs food for the roots to continue to be healthy to produce babies , I don't know what other people do but this is how i have always done it and I have very little fail rate in leaves rooting and getting babies , I am now trying just perlite as the rooting medium to see how it works for me but a mild constant feed has already shown for me that it works , maybe you should do some leaves with the mild feed and some without to see what works best for you :)
Connie :)
Connie, did you get your Violet Gallery order? I got mine today and just opened the box to begin potting up!
Will leave feedback later on GWD.
Hi Shanika ,
I think I am getting my plants from VG next week as I was getting plants and leaves and so my order was a bit more complicated than just leaves and I told Brenda on the phone that it didn't matter if i have to wait for a couple of weeks , that I didn't want her pulling her hair out trying to get it to me this week ....................................so are you happy with your leaf order from VG ? i am sure you are , they always send good quality leaves and plants , the leaves are just the right age not tiny limp things and not old hard leaves , i wish you very good luck with them , let us all know how they are doing and I will let you know when I get mine :)
you all have been talking about rooting and ways to root and I just wanted to mention that leaves that are rooted in water get water roots and so can grow fine in water with the right conditions as with hydroponics and when they are grown in soil they have roots for soil ..........so two different kinds of roots are produced ..........and thus leaves/ plants that are going from water to soil will grow new soil roots and may be delayed but still do fine ..................good thing things adapt :)
Connie :)
WEll........everyone is touting Violet Gallery for plants, too. Might have to check out both......don't have enough plants growing (????)
I act like I live in the northern part of the US and must get everything now for the winter!
Connie,
The plant material was just fine. The leaves all looked very healthy and were firm. Some were large, most were medium and 1 or 2 were really small(Rare Tapestry). On the the small one, he sent 3 leaves instead of 2.
He sent me a few gifts too, which I was thrilled about! He sent some really nice subsititutions too. One called Blue Tail Fly is the most different AV I've ever seen! The bottom of the leaf sort of curls backward and upward. Even the texture of the leaf is different than any other I've seen. I got a few of David Senk's leaves too. Wanted to try them since I'd heard some folk rave about them. Oh, and I got a few Russian leaves too. They make very pretty flowers.
I got most of them potted up yesterday in a few hours. Will finish this morning.
Let me see if I can find the picture of Blue Tail Fly that Allison sent me (she is no longer on DG)........
Bummer, my pictures are not in any order......another project for another day..........
Shanika , I am so glad you liked your leaf order , the Blue Tail Fly is a wasp and has bustleback foliage , I have that one too and got it from VG , I also got some of the Wizard varieties , they have almost black leaves and the flowers are very striking , one is called Wizards Blue Stones ............Gail did I send you a leaf of that one ? .................or maybe it was Jim , or maybe both of you , anyway it is lovely with black/green , shiny leaves and blue wasp flowers , just yummy :) so if anyone wants wasp flowers with really pretty leaves the Wizards are really nice , I am glad they gave you some gifts , they really are nice sellers and lovely people , I hope they all grow like crazy for you Shanika :) I can't wait to get my order from them , I am planning to add some of the leaves from the plants I get to the RR box so I hope the plants have a couple of leaves to spare but also i am going to add some leaves from my David Thompson plants as they are so big and beautiful that they have many to spare and I want to pass some on :) Gail I know you are joining the RR but Shanika are you going to join in too , you should if you can cause it is really fun , you get the box and you can't wait to see what is inside and then you get to pass on some of your favorites to others to enjoy , it is a hoot :) Talk to you all later , hope you are having a wonderful Friday and will have a lovely weekend , I plan to plant of course as well as the fun stuff like washing floors and cleaning toilets etc , LOL
Connie :) Wizards Blue Stones
Has anyone tried rooting AV cuttings using those cups filled with clear rooting hormone gel?
these: http://www.greenhousecatalog.com/rooting-6pack-p-293.html
I'm trying it right now, and 1 of the four leaves has started growing roots. But now I'm not sure when would be the best time to transfer it to a more traditional growing medium.
Does anyone have experience with these cups?
Thanks!
Phoenix Ryan