End of April Blooms

I think we all get those day... I had a great day then this evening I got sad... no reason or rhyme just the pits..LOL I am in bed typing t his and trying to read a book on Av. I ordered an out of date book on The Miracle Houseplant: The Gesneriad Family by the Elberts Ki recommended it also joined the society and they are sending a 25 page booklet also... can't wait to get them...I Have to admit allot of this messes with my brain cells... can't keep it stright..LOLOLOl
Ok trying to go back to bed now.. See you all tomorrow and have a great day.
Hug,
Susan

SOrrry one more quesiton... where do you buy the bottoms that have the little holes in them and then put your pots on top and hang the wick?
sue

are you asking about individual reservoirs or the trays with the grids on them..........

Gail I am so glad they found your purse!! As you mentioned the biggest nightmare would be replacing everything!

If that blue band was a rubber band and I snapped myself every time I complained I still think all I'd end up with is a swollen wrist!! LOL

Kim the plants that your grew and shared with Gail are totally awesome!! Do you think datura would grow for me here? The rule of thumb is to wait until after Memorial Day to plant outside where I live. Would that give them enough time to mature and bloom? I guess I could go do my own research but your so knowledgeable and right here .....^_^

Beacon Trail semi mini AV is happy right now...
~Brenda

Beautiful plant Brenda!

Brenda, I have a Datura that has come back in my garden now for two years. It's the single purple. These Datura I have right now I grew from seed in October and have been nursing them over and waiting to put them outside. They are not hardy, however, they reseed and come back or you can store the seed and start them in the spring.

Datura are VERY toxic though Brenda. If there is a chance an animal or child may put the leaves in their mouths, I would not recommend growing them. I don't have any animals and my children are both teenagers so I feel safe growing them. This year I'm trying some of them in containers and I may put a couple in the ground but mostly I'm going to try in big pots. The Ballerina is a mini datura and was bred for container growing :)

VERY cute AV Brenda :) Looks SO full :)

Gail, I need one of those blue bands *lol* But like Brenda, I think I would end up with a swollen wrist big time too *lol* You know, I try not to complain or whine........but it just comes naturally *lol*

XO
Kim

the bottoms then everyone has what looks to be grids on the tops... I found the grids at Lowes for 15.00 a sheet of shorts but do they come made or do you all make your own? I have to work today so unless someone is up early I will read when I get hom...
I hope Kims(dimmer) first day is good for her today... I worry about her... She is this tall skinney thing that can get blown over by those trucks...LOL Also her tooth... I will have to call her later...
Thanks for the help.
Susan
Ps... Really glad you got your purse back... It is scary when that happens.

Brenda...........when you have time I need some lessons on being able to grow trailers as beautiful as you do! How often do you pinch the centers out and then how do you get that many blooms on one that big!

I order my grids from Violetshowcase for 4.00 each but cutting them is much less expensive . I just don't have anyone to cut them to size for me, Susan.

I need BEGINNING lessons on AV trailers as I just got my first ones! LOL The Teeny Bopper one really scares me just to look at it. It looks like it's growing tall - how do they actually grow? For some reason thought they would be like an actual vining plant. But the way that one is growing, I'm not so sure. Unless it gets so tall, then the weight pulls it down to trail? I don't know.....Does that one need extra humidity? Has anyone here grown it before to give their experience? Well, I've got to get ready for work. Have to work until 7-7:30 tonight. Ugh...
Diane

Diane: I found this information at The Violet Barn site regarding trailers: http://www.robsviolet.com/trailing_violets1.htm

Sure sounds like your plant has a mind of it's own if it's growing vertically instead of horizontally, huh? Look at this photo of Teeny Bopper at Rob's site: http://www.robsviolet.com/teeny_bopper.htm Maybe they do grow up and then out?

And, look at this pic in PF: http://davesgarden.com/guides/pf/showimage/131037/

Both of them look like they grow up and then out in a ball shape.

thank you, ProfessorLin!!!! I want mine round and big.............thanks for the site!

Yes, thank you Lin for those links, I'm going to be checking them out more closely as I have some baby trailers coming up and i want to start them off right!!

As far as the ones I do have are concerned it's complete accident if they look good! LOL I had no idea there were all those steps needed to get good form!

Mine have been grown on a bakers rack in the window and just let be. I figured it said they were trailers so they would just do their thing. Which is why I have such varying looks to my trailers I guess.

I bought five of them from Cedar Creek Violets on eBay just over a year ago and here's what they look like now. As you can see only Beacon Trail really looks like it should.... and now I know why! ^_^

They were very tiny when they came!
~Brenda

I really shouldn't do this but since I have no fear that my oldest DD will ever come cruising around on DG I'll get away with it. LOL

When I ordered the 5 Trailing violets from Cedar Creek one was Ramblin' Spots. Well they sent my a free gift of Ramblin' Spots also. Both violets were the exact same size when they arrived.

When they got a bit bigger I potted them both into self watering containers and gave one to my oldest daughter. She's not into plants but I figured all she had to do was keep the self watering pot full, right? At first hers bloomed and looked like mine but then she was busy etc etc. Well a month ago I went and rescued the poor thing!! LOL

Here are the two Ramblin' Spots now, that are the exact same age and from the same vendor etc.....Shows the difference basic care makes to a plant! ^_^
~Brenda

Oh my goodness! Your DD's plant looks like mine! LOL.

I have/had one trailer that I got in a trade when I first joined DG .. it had no label and she couldn't remember the name ... it sorta looked just like that with pretty light pink blooms. I think it's totally kaput, going to look for it now.

Wow, big difference in those two plants! I turn my trailers around and around to form a ball. They are under lights. They are balls of leaves and flowers. They will lean a bot to one side if I don't turn them. Even if they are almost under the middle of the lights, they still like to be turned, as least mine do. You can pinch them too. I pull out the leaves that don't look good and let light inside too.

I turn all of the plants around and move them to get them all even. Does anyone else do that? I look at them every day to see if they are leaning at all. My two rows of lights on each shelf are spread apart the way they like it, but they still like to be turned sometimes.

This little plant is FULL of buds! Hard to see.

Marjorie Bullard was telling me how important it is to never use too big of a pot for any african violet. She was saying you have to look at the root mass before you ever pot up to anything. I think one of the biggest mistakes I am making is using too big of a pot for my plants.

Here is the good part, though. Whenever a plant doesn't look good, it generally doesn't have very good root system........so I just take the plant out and start all over with it. If it has neck, she said to scrape the neck with sharp knife and cut the roots off at the bottom and then to start over planting the neck much deeper. (you may not even have to cut the roots off at the bottom )

This morning I ran around with broken paper clips pinning down the trailers so they will root on top of the soil with their leggy look.

Very nice plant Sally! Great shape to it. I hope you will post another photo when all those buds open! I love the way the little flowers stand up like that ... I bet it is beautiful when in full bloom!

Pretty plant Sally but does it have more than one crown in the pot? It looks like it does. Marjorie is trying to teach me that I can have a ball that big (over a long period of time of growing) from one crown as they can't be entered into a show with more than one crown to start with.

May I ask where you got that one? I know you started growing avs shortly ago and that one is beautiful.

***edited to say I bet you bought it from Marjorie at the February show as she grows that one and I bought one, too................

This message was edited Apr 29, 2008 10:36 AM

My trailers just won't get big and fat but I don't really know if I am just impatient or if I don't know what I am doing.

Here is my one poor little Always Pink with only one crown but I can't seem to make her start growing outwards and to the sides...........

This one has been growing for a year and this is all I can get so far..........called something like Bumble's Orchard Magnet or ?????????

Anyway...........I need lots of help on learning to grow trailers!

Look at this weird sinningia I took last night...........but I just looked over and the bloom is open so I will take a pic of the bloom in a minute

This is a standard trailer called Rolling Cloudbursts but she is not supposed to look this way.........big decision whether to just sell her at the sale or keep trying to make her look as she is supposed to look.

Oh, I like that Orchard's Bumble Magnet! Found a pic at the AVSA site: http://www.avsa.org/Photographs/Orchard'sBumbleMagnetLrg.jpg#http://../Photographs/Orchard'sBumbleMagnetLrg.jpg%23

Jan, where are you. Here is your baby with its' first bloom!

laughing out loud as mine doesn't look like that beautiful picture.......thank you, Lin!

Gail, I don't see anything weird about that sinningia! It is beautiful! Do you know the name on that one??

I keep going back and looking at that Sinningia! It is going to be Awesome ... look at all those buds!

That Rolling Pink Cloudburst looks great too! I love the form of that one! I guess I just am not into the AV's enough to the point where they have to be perfect and have that exact shape required for show rules. LOL.

I was having so much fun with my plants until I heard "the rules".........now I laughingly stay frustrated!!! I need to do some googling as that sinningia has the name of Amizade and I didn't think that Amizade looked like that............be back in a minute with another picture of what Amizade is.

What a NEAT sinningia Gail :)
Love the fuzzies :)
Like Lin said......what is her name? She's SO cute!

YES, that's her!

And WHAT a cutie :)

http://www.gesneriads.ca/sinni118.htm

Oh my gosh! It does look like this. I need to repot her and take good care of her as she is getting leggy. I guess I better let her bloom first.

She is still in the original solo pot that Jan sent her in as a baby.

Brenda, we are calling you the pro on this forum when it comes to growing! You are amazing with that trailer! AT least it gives me hope.

Gail I don't know if it is from Marjorie. It is so tight, hard to tell about the crown. It is full of offshoots. If I got it from Marjorie and she only grows one crown, it must have one crown. Just don't remember where it was from. It is happy and pretty so that is what I love, not going to have it in a show anyway.

I have been growing more seriously since last fall, but I did grow violets before. I had lights etc. My hubby's g.mother got me interested and grew them quite a while.

Beautiful trailers everyone.I must admit mine always tend to look more like Brendas daughters..lol...I think i need to go over those lessons too..

I apologize Sally........I was thinking that you got started in the fall...............and I was trying to figure out how you got that gorgeous monster of a plant in 9 months.........

Gail- I love that fuzzy Sinn you called weird! LOVE love it!
I am home for lunch and clicked the link you posted Lin! I saw all the detailed instructions and thought- Whoops! Better wait until tonight when I have more time for all that to sink in. Thanks!
Would any of ya'll think that my little Teeny Bopper needs to be in a terrarium? It just scares me the leaves ar so tiny..

I had another bloom open on Bristol's Doo Wop today..weird thing is it looks totally different than the other blooms have?..much darker deeper color ..almost like it doesn't belong..lol... I really like it but it seems odd to me..

Nancy, That is one Stunning Plant! I LOVE that color!