Thank you!
Connie,I'll be putting a smile on your face maybe today,,,,,,maybe tommorow ^_^
Sure will save you a cutting of sinn paula Bonnie.
chirita tamiana
December Gessies
Me too, Jan! Please!!!!! For spring :) Wow, the 2 leaves you sent me of the Tamiana are doing great. Now I can see what the finished product will be. Thanks for posting that one. I am excited now! SO pretty, and I have it. YAY!!!!!
Here I was commenting on how beautiful Jan's flowers are and somehow I missed Shanika's. DUH!!!! Shanika, those are very beautiful!!!! Spiritual Corridor is stunning! They ALL are :)
Jannich, I'm delighted to see your lovely chirita tamiana. Where do you keep yours? I have mine in a terrarium under fluorescent lights.
Hello wandygirl,I have 2 pots of tamiana.One grows on the window sill and the other grows on the plantstand under lights.There beautiful aren't they.
Hi!
The lurker here...
Want to wish you all a very nice Christmas and New Years! You are family and I hope you all can be warm and full and thankful this year is about over. We are heading out in the AM for Texas so we can spend Christmas with our two Grandchildren. They are 3 and 5, so I know we will have a good Christmas , Just being with them.
We are driving down and so far we have no snow here. I hope we don't wake up to any in the morning. I'll be back and lurking again soon.
Lurker Lou
Hey Lou!
Maybe you can get this before you turn off your computer. Please have a safe trip and give the grand kids lots of hugs and kisses. Merry Christmas and hurry back to lurk some more:)
Connie
I'm being blessed with something opening every couple of days it seems. Nice for these dreary "almost" winter days:) We are having a blizzard, BTW. Hubby and I are snowed in and we are eating comfort food, watching TV and just enjoying each other's company. I've done plant stuff today, too, of course.;)
This is Burgundy Ruffles- how I love any strep with a yellow center!
Beautiful, Shanika! I was wondering about you. We pull in the east coast stations and they had forecasted snow...2 ft. in one area. I hope that's not you. Time to snuggle with your hubby :)
Hey Connie!
Yep, that's me. We expect 20-30 inches by the time it's all done in the morning!
OMG!!!!!
Love your picture Shanika!!
20-30 inches....Oh No!! We had 13 last week and a little after that and right now it looks like it could be spring before it melts.Stay warm and comfy ^_^.
Lou,have a wonderful and blessed holiday season!! I also want to extend wonderful holiday wishes to all of you!! I work in retail and have not had much computer time for a few weeks.Just know I am thinking of you all!!
Lynn
Hey Lynn,
Can't wait to chat with you after the Holidays!;)
Hugs,
Shanika
Jan, love your Paula! So, I was worried that the leaves on the Spec. Jean you sent me are turning under on the tips, but it looks like yours are too. Normal? I put it up really close to the light because I understand they require a bit more light to bloom than streps or avs.
Frosty Twilight
Beautiful! The name kind of goes along with the season and your weather right now LOL
uh huh! LOL
Oh that starik nebo is just gorgeous. I already had it on my list and am glad I do as it's just lovely. And I always love looking at everyone's streps maybe one of these days I'll get some extra space and will be able to try them.
Morning! OMG Shanika.How much snow did you actully get? Down here in AL we had a week of heavy rain.They just declared my county a diaster area.Roads washed out,creeks flooding.Schools closed for a few days,there now opened but parents have to drive the kids out to a paved roads to catch the bus..More rain coming this weekend.That sinningia ,the leaves just grow like that I think.I tryed giving it extra humidy but the leaves stayed the same.How's your leaves? Did they root?
Hey Jan!!!!
We got 21 inches when all was said and done. All schools in Maryland are closed today. I'm at home with my youngen, couldn't find child care. So, I'll do some plant grooming and make a gingerbread house with my daughter.
Yes, the leaves did root, but no babies yet. The small rooted cutting of Jean is growing nicely. The leaves turned yellow, so I scaled back on the water. All the Kohlerias are doing nicely, basking close to the light;) Sinningia Seminole seems very happy. Maybe I will get a bloom soon!
21 inches,thats quite a snowfall all at once.Good I'm happy everything is growing good.You will have blooms in know time.The sinningia leaves I rooted took quite awhile to put up babies.I'm going to transplant them today.Have a good day,Jan
Pale Ryder
Miss Mable
Fall Fresco
They are gorgeous-- especially like Miss Mable!!
Thank you all for sharing your pretty blooms. I am so happy to see them. Maybe I'll have some pics to post when my baby plants grow up.
You sure will!!! I have some leaves down as well which are making babies. If I play my cards right, I'll have more pics to post in several months! LOL Patience is a virture, right? I keep telling myself that. AV babies come much faster than strep babies for me. I've gotta say though, that I've done much better with this batch of leaves than the ones from last year. It was a total disaster, with soil mealies. I was heartbroken. Then, some very dear DGers sent me some leaves to try again and so far I've been successful. I can't wait to share them in the Spring!
Shanika,
Your plants look great!! I think I need to increase my light or something.My plants are growing,but not much bloom lately.
Very nice, Shanika!
Thank you Lynn and Connie! I am really trying to keep them happy. Many of the ones that are blooming now are David Thompson hybrids that I got a couple of months ago. Upon the advice of some great DGers, I immediatedly removed his soil and put it in my mix(a modified recipe of Marie Burns show recipe). I must say I am impressed with how it is treating my plants so far. I am hand watering all except the NOIDS in my other post where I am wicking. I use a very weak solution of Jack's Classic 20-20-20 fert. but alternate with just plain water sometimes. I used to have 4 lights on each shelf, until I found out that was waaaaaaaaay too much for AVs. Well, the streps seem to like it with just two lights too! :) I think the real test is going to come when the temps start getting warm again. I will have to be creative in keeping those streps cool. Having just one set of lights on each shelf should help keep the temps down some! Gosh, I don't know what I was thinking last year. Well, yes, I do. The more light the better, but no necessarily so!!! My orchids love that, but not my gessies!
What is the distance between your leaves and your lights? I have mine about the same as the a.v.s but I wasn't sure. Someone on here mentioned they like more light. I was given 4 leaves (thanks again, DGer!!!!!!) and they rooted faster for me than some a.v. leaves I put down. Must have really been fertile LOL!!!!! They look good :) I am also using the same medium that I use on the a.v.s
Some members grow Streps. in higher light,but I don't seem to see a difference on the strength of the lights.However,my shelves are big and only have 2 lights on each shelf.When I let them run 14 hours a day I have better bloom,but then some of the AVs need to be moved to lower light areas.
In general,Streps. need a leaner mix than most other Gessies.
Can we start a strep soil thread, or is there one already? I have a couple but am not sure I have them in the right soil. One is in 1/2 perlite 1/2 whatever peat soil mix I had. A couple are in 1/3 perlite, 1/3 peaty soil mix 1/3 little fir bark. And the other 2 I am scared to death to change because they are living, but not blooming, but living is good. Does anyone know if gessies are affected by unvented propane heaters? I know orchids will drop blossoms from it so other plants may be affected. I want to see them happy instead of just survive :(.
I hadn't heard of the fir bark one but members here use different mixtures. I use 1:1:1 for all of my gessies right now. 1-perlite 1-vermeculite 1-pro-mix. The plants seem pretty happy in it.
I was looking for good drainage. It was fairly recent, (a month or so) so I am not sure if they like it or not.
Here is the mix I use on my streps and AVs, with some charcoal thrown in. I use the extra perlite because I wick my AVs and streps need it even without wicking....
1 gal Canadian Peat
1 gal Vermiculite
2 gal Perlite
1 Tbls Bone Meal
1/4 cup Cow Manure
4 Tbls Domolite
I have some Marathon on the the way, so will also begin using that when I pot up next.
Oh, forgot to add that when I potted up some streps last weekend, I threw a tablespoon of worm castings in the bowl with the mix. No ill effects so far. I'm just sort of going through trial and error at this point. Trying a few like this, a few like that and so on.
Now, I must add that you should not put starter plants in the mix I listed above. The bone meal, manure and lime would be too much for them and burn.
Someone also asked how far I have my strep leaves from the light- some of them are 8-12 inches and others are not even under lights. They are simply next to the light stand, getting SOME light. They still root and produce babies that way too. But, once they start producing babies, I stick them under the lights.
I root my strep leaves in all perlite or in some cases, with a smidgen of vermiculite. My last batch of leaves, however, were rooted in a pro-mix/perlite mix that I bought from one of my AV club members. The streps seem to like that fine. I have also found that if you use those seed cell packs with the domes, the leaves root quicker and produce babies faster. I think it is because of the small size of the cell- the roots don't have to travel all over trying to fill up a big pan, if that makes sense. Domes are a necessity when rooting AVs and Streps. They absolutely must have that constant humidity.
Midnight Velvet...
It was hard to get a clear, true-to-color shot of this one... .sorry it's a little blurry!
....
How pretty. I appreciate the recipe. I copied it onto a sticky and will get to work on finding the couple things I don't have and make that. I have a bunch of av leaves that will need pots some time and maybe I'll get courageous enough to repot the last 2 streps that I'm afraid to touch, lucky strike and purple peppered.