Monday, November 24, 2014

Africken Violets




As another Lame Cherry exclusive in matter anti matter.

I dislike pot plants, both dope head and house type. They always seem to be refusing to live and manifesting some trouble of growing like weeds or just sitting there like a cat, waiting for you to notice them, so they can then disappoint you.

So I killed TL's African Violet. With kindness mind you, in it was having a problem and I replanted it with fertilized soil and it killed it quicker than if I dumped herbicide on it.
I killed a transplant Mom grew with too much water to it........I killed three other leaves in that fertilized soil........was not having a good time with African Violets.
Odd as I have stated, no one can grow those things, and that is one of the things Mom can grow like weeds.

TL was pinching leaves off of the latest African Violet to get it to bloom as the experts advise this, and me in a theft mode, I pinched the throw away leaves as an experiment, as this is how Mom grows new plants.
You just stuff the stems in the soil and in about a month, they produce wee baby little African Violets.

It is really a cheap and effective way to grow these things.

This is my adventure in this, as I find people never tell you things in being experts which I notice and as I notice them in the Holy Ghost, then there must be a reason for it.

I put these leaves into Home Depot, clay type potting soil.......no fertilizer. Being concerned as last time they rotted, I did not lay them on the soil too close as Mom does. They stayed green and not black, so I assumed I was not killing things again.
They are in indirect sun from the morning, and I have to water these about twice a week, as the air blowing on them makes the soil crack. African Violets like dry soil I am told, but I also know the violet TL has, came with sopping wet soil. I tend to just water it when it looks cracked dry in this clay, let it drain out, and then leave it. It seems to not die this way, and they should never die, as you know it rains like the deluge in Africa at times, and those violets do not all go leaves down from that.

The thing I noticed in this which I desired to share was, that a little over 2 weeks into this, the leaves picked themselves off the soil and started standing up. I showed this to TL and we both concluded it was a sign they were growing. I assume they have now grown roots and are in the process of becoming new plants.
African Violets have myriads of these little hairs on them like tomatoes, and this is what apparently the new roots grow from.

Granted I have no baby leaves or miniature violets yet, but this is a process which does indeed work, even for an African Violet Killer like me.

I am still disappointed that a number of baby things got dead from that Scotts soil. It dissolved the roots of my baby apple sprouts, worked over Filipino oranges, and killed an apple......besides the African violets. I think it about tanked a shamrock too.
I have seen plants burned from fertilizer, but this was different, in it just melted the plants. I do not see a great deal of value in the stuff, as in the wee baby apples it turned the leaves to a loden green, almost black in being so high octane, but there was not any explosive growth as one expects with high nitrogen content.
The only sigh in this is, I am just glad it was not me killing things as having a black thumb should only be left to Obama types with volumes of pigment cosmetics.

So now I wait for the new leaves to get out of Dodge. I do not mind the plants being just four leaves sticking up there as they are plants, and appear to be turning into something more. Not like I need 4 African Violets as I was not allured by them in the first place. I simply was moved in if I made the plant into compost to have some back ups.....and it appears I have a replacement magazine generating to be locked and loaded.

That is nuff said, but it appears at least in this violet type that the leaves lift off the soil a ways as proof that something is turning into a plant.

agtG