Changes Can Cause Problems

But WHICH CHANGES?

For a couple of months I watched as things did not quite look right with some of my plants. 
About a 3rd of the plants were in bloom and seemed fine.  By the time blooms started to fade though, centers started looking like crap.
Other, smaller recently divided plants developed a second crown or looked stunted. 

Centers that don't look "right"

makes me worry. 

I've been through this before!

 
BUT some things had gradually changed:

• For most of the winter cold months I had rolled the shelving unit to the hallway off the kitchen so we could close off the area they normally grew. They went back once it got "warmer". Too soon?
• I had started wick-watering more, with some bottom watering in individual saucers. That meant less leaching from top watering.
• Domes were removed. 
• Usual soil mix ingredients were out of stock all winter. I experimented! ONE WAS HIGH IN CLAY AND SAND texture. The other got horrible reviews. Were those people right?

Over Memorial Day Weekend I repotted EVERYTHING. Lots of duplicates got chucked into the trash if they looked too bad.   Nothing was really overdue for repotting but when I started turning out the plants it was clear the soil mix since December was too sandy. It was drying out way too soon. Some of the plants were still in Solo Cups. If what was happening was something toxic in the mix or a lack of nutrients, the small containers were perhaps bringing it on faster?

THINGS ARE IMPROVING...
(It's only been 2 weeks but I am an optimist!)

• I bought Miracle Grow potting soil and just added a little perlite. 
• I potted a lot of things UP to a size larger than I had been doing, especially standards. (Future topic: SOLO CUPS...Solution or Part of the Problem?)
• I put TALL domes back over everything on 2 of 3 shelves. THOSE look the most improved!

(At my request!) A local nursery started stocking TALLER DOMES when they opened for the spring. They're pricier than they should be! But the larger micro-climate seems easier to control for my conditions than the short domes. I'm going to go back to more of my tried & true top-watering method. Domes mean less watering, although over-watering is more obvious when I get it wrong!

On a positive note:
Violet Voice has it's latest Virtual Show online right now.
 (Go vote!)

I managed to get a few things entered before they started failing miserably. Some were sacrificed willingly for practicing more Design efforts. 
More about those efforts later! 

 

I'll do the best I can NOT to kill my African Violets on purpose. 
But crap happens sometimes! I'll see soon enough if I'm dealing with this right...

When the obvious stares back at you...

Temperature control and a bit of humidity can't hurt! 

In the past, growing plants under domes hasn't worked that well for me. 

The climate inside tends to be too moist.  

Self-confessed hoverers tend to over-water?

Condensation is generally excessive. 

I looked at 2 trays side-by-side on the shelf the other day and realized Tiger Trail babies under a vented dome were growing faster than than those in open air.  

Well, what do you know?! 

I went and found an extra dome for the tray without one. I do have the ends propped open with clothespins for maximum venting. 

And I'm trying hard to resist watering too much!

Temperatures are below seasonably cold right now and the wood stove gives the thermostat a false sense of what's "warm enough" for the rest of the house. 

I'm stubbornly nurturing ALL of these as treasured prizes and ignoring the "limit your collection" resolution for this variety. 

Never mind pointing out how big they'll get! 

The cream colored variegation seems to holding well for the ones that started that way. The pink tinged ones seem to be consistent as well. 

I like them all! 

I think I put one in a box I was packing to send home with Sara after Christmas.

And then I took it back.  How stingy?!

Nobody asked me, but ...

The latest issue of AVSA's magazine is out.
People are putting it down asking for hugs it's that depressing.
It was probably not by design that so many of the articles are about dead plants or terminal AV diseases that there's no cure for.
It's the dead of winter for many of us.
A little Hope & Hurry up Spring would have gone a long way to lift the spirits!

Even the lady who took over the Miniature column showcased what she called "mistakes".

I'm sorry... those are some seriously neglected plants.

The Thinking Small column was always my favorite of the magazine when written by Pat Richards.

Small Talk seems to suffer from "it's all been said before" syndrome.
Or "confession is good for the soul"?   (For goodness sake... snap out of it!)

A mistake is accidentally  ruining the center of the little plant in a thumb pot just as it's about to bloom. 

Over fertilized, over watered or over zealous repotting. OR all 3!

I'm letting it bloom and trying to ignore how I crapped it up so fast.

A mistake MIGHT be planting a "strawberry" Mickey Mouse Jar full of plantlets you could not bring yourself to throw into the compost bin.

Mickey Mouse (H. Inpijn) Double dark blue. Dark green, pointed/red back. Miniature.

I might have gotten carried away with deciding which Mickey Mouse plantlets to keep. 

So I kept all of them! Shut up.

A few "Mickey Mouse" extras went into the terrarium that's been coasting along since it was blogged about here a very long time ago. (2009?) These were the "too little to bother with" plantlets that totally should have been discarded. And I would have too. Except the terrarium was nearly empty.
And they're living... for now!

One of my terrarium's biggest mistakes was using perlite in the soil and not getting around to fixing that after killing the moss that was going to hide it originally. All of the other plants have come and gone, too. Except the possible "Ming (false?) Arailia" growing in back.
It fills the jar now, but I still don't know what it is!

Making Kids Cry

That kind of week!

Lollipop Kid had a water bottle tip over onto it when I went to set it down on the wire rack shelving and crushed a leaf over the edge of its pot.  I didn't notice the damage when it happened, but the next day found this sad tear rolling out of the leaky break.

Earlier in the day Jax went after a buzzing housefly that was bouncing off one of the T-8 bulbs and knocked a tray of plants on the lower shelf sliding sideways. Not too much damage, other than a few tipped starter plants. I took Beca's Pink Crochet out of the self-watering planter and yanked a row of haloing leaves off, so it was smaller anyways. 
It has a few less leaves now.

I potted up 2 leaf pots of babies for this variety, but it's very pink (possibly unacceptable *) blossoms aren't likely to make my future Favorites List. 
The spooning/haloing leaves only makes it worse. 


It was not too hard to keep only 4 of the nearly 20 plantlets produced by 3 leaves. I tried to pick just a couple of the larger plantlets WITHOUT spooning leaves. I don't know if it's something I'm doing (or not doing) but Beca'a Pink Crochet is racking up a longer list of "cons" than "pros"...the word "crochet" might not save it!
 
* Pink has to pass the Acceptable Pink test in our household, as defined by daughter Stephani. ;) 

Later still in the day, I went to take something out of Jax's mouth, while holding a leaf pot in my other hand. She made a grab for the leaf cup of Optimara Little Moonstone and chomped a slice in one of the 2 leaves.
Luckily, not the one actually just starting to pop up babies. 

Trinket Terrific is surviving it's rough treatment for some sort of bug. it's putting on growth finally, but not sure I trust it to be pest free yet. Or ever. Yanked off all its roots (twice) and sloshed it up an down, first rubbing alcohol, then Safer Soap treatment the next week when aphid-like bug was found on the backs of several Round Robin leaves. They all got treated.
They should probably have all been pitched.
 
below left:
Reflections of Spring has the biggest blossoms ever! 
Rob's Heat Wave will make my Favorites List!

Rob's Heat Wave family photo

 
I had too many leaves set in the solo cup, so tried to move one off on its own. Broke the mother leaf right off. These very tiny babies trying to survive on their own are Exhibit-A for why "you should not be at it all the time".

"What did you do to my Ma?" ;)

Ma's Second Thoughts

I started updating my newest African Violet arrivals in the tab section at the top, rather than individually. While I was editing the pictures I took to tell part of the story, it became clear I may be a little too rough with my handling of new arrivals. 

I once proclaimed this to be @LaurieCare - a risk factor all plants coming into contact with me faced. 

 Perhaps I need to refine my er... technique...quite a bit!

Ma's Second Thoughts (before)

Ma's Second Thoughts (after)

Elise

Time will tell how well their recovery goes. But the enjoyment of the moment did my inner well-being a world of good.
My recovery is well under way! ;)

(Perhaps a  patch of light hanging over a few plants on the kitchen counter should be prescribed instead of so many anti-depressant pills?)

I picked up a new shop light & package of T8 tubes at Home Depot a week or two ago. 

THEY DON'T BUZZ!!

So, when HD sent me an email with a $10 off coupon I decided to replace the other one as well.  Mine were all from about 2003, I suspect.

Headed to the garden center checkout. She declined the coupon! The lights weren't technically found in the garden center. The fine print I neglected to read apparently would have pointed out the coupon came with strings. I asked for someone higher-up to plead my case to. (I tried the nice "Customer is always right" approach" of pleading, with some begging thrown in for good measure.)

Invoked "I'm a valued customer...it says so right on that coupon!"

Okay, she was pretty insistent it wouldn't do any good: I may have said "I should just walk away and go to Lowe's." oops!

Turns out whomever she finally spoke with once she picked up the phone to give it shot asked if the "Customer was being Nice About It?"  She said yes... ?

I got the discount.

AND LIGHTS THAT DON'T BUZZ!

Back away from the plants!

Lime Jewel

Later on Day 2.

Halfway into writing the previous entry I went to the light stand to take a few pictures. You must have pictures on a blog!

I wanted to document the curly leaves of Lime Jewel so that if when it improves I can show happy before and after pictures.

That's the plan...

While I was at it I wanted to get pictures of my recycled reservoir.

Recognize it? 

Coleslaw dish from Kentucky Fried Chicken.

Told Tom we were going to eat there again soon. For a good cause!

I was kind of messy re-potting the new arrivals. Nothing has had a bath or even been brushed with a soft paint brush yet for any kind of grooming. Figured they had enough stress trekking across country.  It could wait a few days. 

There was dust all over the top of the red cover so without thinking I blew onto it to take some of the dirt out of the next camera shot. Went flying in all directions for 2 feet across my sewing room table.  CRAP.

Lime Jewel may be one of those plants I'll need to start by leaf and grow completely under my own conditions. Right now it's hard to believe this ugly little duckling is ever going to straighten out. I took at least 5 leaves off when it arrived and several are propagating. 
(I did pretty well NOT planting every leaf I removed.)

Already with the oops!

Storybook Princess

Day 2.

I turned on the lights for the day and stopped to take a quick peek to see how everything was doing. (Because so much could happen in 24 hours, right?!)

Are leaves still firm? 

Hefted a plant pot to check weight - nothing is dried out so leave the water bottle alone!

Are the leaves relaxing yet and becoming less curled?

And then it happened.

I TOUCHED LEAVES.

Blueberry Kisses

I admit it: I touch leaves. 

Just about everything ever written say's don't do it!  

But it seems I {still} can't seem to help myself. 

Maybe they need help laying flatter?  

I rotate pots trying to get the leaves to turn towards the light in attempt to help them self-straighten. I pressed down lightly on Storybook Princess and there was lots of flexibility. I thought, "You look better already!" 

And moved on to her neighbor, Blueberry Kisses. 

A light press of my finger to see if that leaf sticking up in the air would settle down. Crunch. The sound and feel of a leaf stem snapping nearly off. Damn!

The little voice in my head said, "See, I told you so...no hovering!"

The tag "oops" will probably see many more entries fall into that category as I go along. {Sigh.}