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Our first biography is on Don Geiss who will be writing a regular column for us. His first column can be found just below his bio. He was good enough to give us two installments now to give us a little boost. Thanks Don. |
VioletReflections is a club |
Sandy Crawford has agreed to take over as editor of this newsletter. I am sure she will do a great job and am looking forward to working with her. |
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This month I would like to introduce Don Geiss to the members of our list. |
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Don has been growing African violets since the late 1940’s. He admits that his first attempts yielded nothing but green leaves. Later of course he did have much flowering success. He has college degrees in Conservation Education and Educational Media from Michigan State University. He also taught there as an Assistant Professor for seven years. Later he taught at Mansfield State University in Pennsylvania. Back in his home state of Michigan in supposedly semi-retirement he began a new career in newspaper writing. Later he switched to free lance writing and contributed to a number of publications. He writes regularly for the African Violet Magazine. Don is listed on the African Violet Society of America’s Web Site commercial page although he limits his selling to leaves and soil. He points out that as a retiree shipping plants and the accompanying space and labor involved is a step too much at 75 years of age. He presently has about 1,200 plants depending on the number of sales he has. He has about 150 different cultivars with generally eight of each. He usually has 100 to 250 leaves starting depending on the time of year. Most of Don’s time at the present is taken up with conducting AV seminars with senior and church groups. He is currently heavily involved with conducting the seminars for clubs affiliated with the Michigan Federation of Garden Clubs. He has had as many as 250 ladies in one program. He said, "The thing I enjoy about conducting seminars for those clubs is that we gain people who are successful for the first time in raising those beautiful plants." He estimates that over two thousand people have attended his programs. "Next spring", he said, "we have successive meetings in two days with regional garden clubs." Don noted that there will be about 600 ladies at the two sessions. Don will write on many subjects of his choice and will also write articles where there is a popular demand for any given subject. He cautioned that the subjects will deal with basic questions keeping in mind that many members are just beginning to be concerned with various new techniques. Welcome Don, we will be looking
forward to your columns and we hope you enjoy your membership here.
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THE BASICS by Don Geiss Let us begin the series of articles by pointing out that the writer is a person who is experienced in the basics of raising African Violets. I do not pretend to know about hybridizing, genetics or showing plants. I conduct seminars on the A to Z of raising of the flowering beauties. I believe beginners will not really become devoted to the plants until they have success in raising one or have a mentor who can demonstrate the basics of raising to them.. This is my area of concentration. Maxine and I travel all over the state teaching the basics of AV’s. Having written that perhaps the reader will have a good idea of what the articles will contain. Here are some of the discoveries we have made. People by the thousands have told us "we are not interested in African Violets because we have tried raising them and never had success". They say "we bought a plant at XXX store that had beautiful flowers. We brought it home. It went out of flower and never flowered again. After about three months it just dried up and died." Many of our readers here have faced the same problem but have been willing to try again but this time with advice from people who had the problems long ago and survived. Many of our readers come from lands where there are unique climatic problems. That is understood. The writer can only give you a generalized picture of raising the plants and then the reader must fit them to her/his localized conditions. With that understanding let us first of all look at the reasons why many people say they have no success raising African Violets. The planting material in plants coming from a greenhouse and found in discount stores often contain material like moss that is very wet. People tend to love a plant to death; therefore they keep on over-watering it until it gets root rot , stem rot, or just plain collapses. Often too those plants come with a built in supply of insects that feed upon African Violets. As a result the plant looks terrible shortly after it is purchased and continues to go downhill. Those individuals have had no Violet Reflections egroup to go to for help. We propose to the novices at the very beginning that if they do not know what the AV is planted in then wash the roots off with room temperature water. The individual may wish to wait until it is out of flower. It should then be repotted in material that you know or have had recommended as a good potting material.. We often repot even when it is in flower. The flowering continues so there is at least no apparent harm. We feel that the plant then gets a head start on a long life. Waiting until it is out of flower may be waiting too long and it may get a head start on root rot. Our non-soil mix may be of some interest here. A product by Scotts called Metro Mix 360 is the base material. It contains ground up burned bark, ground up sphagnum moss and washed sand. All of this of course has been heat treated so it is uncontaminated. To this we add equal parts of coarse perlite and extra coarse vermiculite. We mix this material in a small cement mixer because people hereabouts have had success with it and so we sell it by the tons. The basic reason why they demand it is because they have had success with plants using the material. It may well be that many of our readers have developed a confidence in a certain material. We tell those folks "if it ain’t broke don’t fix it". If purchasing from a known African Violet specialist, simply ask them what material they use to plant. If it is compatible with your idea of the best material then certainly do not repot. We must remember though that there are many other reasons that contribute to success. More about success next time. |
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The soil material of course must go into some sort of pot. We as well as most people who raise AV’s use plastic pots. One problem with clay pots is that they hold water in their pores. That often causes the grower to lose control of the amount of water that the plant receives. In addition we have found that the clay pots tend to collect dirt on the outside much more easily and generally look less neat. The size of the pots seems to be a continuing basis for discussion. Our plants turn over rather rapidly simply because they are purchased before they need to go into larger pots. All of them are grown in three inch pots. Seldom do we use the three and one half inch size. Most of the plants that are purchased in the discount houses or florists are in four inch pots. When we have been faced with that type of pot, we remove it simply to look at the root system. If it does not have a root ball that practically fills the four inch pot, it is replanted in a smaller pot. We believe that it takes too long for the plant to flower regularly if it has a small root ball and is planted in a four inch pot. It is widely recognized that AV’s flower best when they are root bound. If the grower feels that the plant absolutely needs to go into a larger pot we recommend that it be to the next larger size. Ours then would go from the three inch pot to the three and one half inch. There is a formula that involves the diameter of the plant for transplanting but generally we suggest that if the plant gets tippy then report. For showing plants though, the judges will be critical if it is in too small a pot for its diameter. If the grower desires to locate the plant(s) in a planter we recommend that they place them there pot and all and then cover everything with soil. That way the size of the root ball is restricted and the plant tends to flower much faster and regularly. Of course there are uses for smaller pots and the plastic cups but we will cover those when writing about starting leaves and starter plants. Fertilizer is a much discussed topic and we will not pretend to tell anyone which is the best balance or manufacture. The three numbers mentioned on each fertilizer container such as 5-10-5 represent what is known as a complete fertilizer. The first number in this case 5 is the nitrogen present in the mix. This controls the leaf color. The second number or 10 is phosphorus. It is needed for growth, flowering and seed formation. The third number potassium is credited for a number of things. According to Melvin J. Robey in his book "African Violets Gifts From Nature" it "is known to have an influence on disease resistance, cool temperature tolerance, nutrient uptake, insect resistance and water loss reduction due to transpiration". We have been using a blossom booster at the present time. A blossom booster has a number like 12-50-10. The important figure here is the middle number because it is the one for flowering, thus 50 contains a large portion of phosphorus to encourage flowering. We have in the past used Peter’s African Violet fertilizer which is 12-36-14 . Often people have indicated to us that they get good results using 15-30-15 which tends to be the most common fertilizer on market shelves. Again we have not been too concerned with such problems that people have raised such as nitrogen (the first number) from urea. Perhaps those who have critical needs for show plants might find that or other numbers more of a concern. The factor that seems to be rather consistent is the amount of any fertilizer one adds to a gallon of water. We use one quarter teaspoon per gallon of water. We feel that constant fertilizing when watering is the best way to provide the proper amount. Whether watering from the top, bottom, mat or reservoir that one quarter per gallon seems to work for growers who have attended our seminars. Here again some AV. enthusiasts vary the amount of fertilizer according to the season or growing status of the plants. Now that we have added the water aspect of growing keep in mind that this seemingly simple part of growing can well be the most problematic. Chemicals placed in city water may be a grave problem. Well water can certainly be a major problem or it can be a blessing. A problem if it contains a chemical that the plants cannot tolerate or a blessing if it is a type that the plants not only tolerate but on which they thrive. Some people must resort to bottled water of one type or another. Methods of watering were mentioned above but perhaps we had better briefly discuss the more common ones. Watering from above is the method most commonly thought of when talking about house plants in general. It is a method used for AV’s but not necessarily the most common, (See our article on the subject in the March-April 2000 AVM ) Watering from the bottom also has found much favor. A word of caution here is that many people nestle the pot in a saucer filled with water and leave it there until all of the water is either taken up by the plant or evaporates. It is suggested that the plant be left in the water only for about 15 minutes and then removed, throw away the remainder of the water and reseat the plant on the saucer. According to the survey that was conducted with the egroup AVConnectionn the majority use the pan or reservoir watering system. This is done by placing a wick consisting of some absorbent material into the pot. The end of the wick is placed in a container filled with fertilized water. Only the wick should be allowed to touch the water. There are other variations of watering which are used by some growers. This narrative is an oversimplified coverage of watering systems but more specific questions can be asked through the Violet Reflections egroup.
Natural and artificial light as well as other aspects of raising AV’s will be covered in the next newsletter. Don Geiss, will be a regular writer for this newsletter. I would like to thank him for finding the time for us and I will be looking forward to his future columns. |
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 Happy growing and showing...from the land of the sleeping giant. |
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Congratulations to Debbie for winning our first vr-bingo game. Her prize was leaves of the 15 varieties she chose to make her card. The game lasted well into September even though we offered several bonus numbers. Congratulations Eleanor winner of Bingo #2, October 1st. Eleanor is the recipient of the 15 leaves she chose to make her vr-bingo card! We will send the prize leaves out as long as the weather holds up. Welcome to all new listmembers.
Please enjoy your stay with us. We are glad to have you.
VioletReflections has a life of it's
own. Yoko said it perfectly in a letter to me this week.
"it
is not me making this happen, it's club members that is!!"
That is what I have been telling all of
you from the beginning. This list belongs to the members! |
Pet Peeves |
-------The Kitchen Korner-------
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Halloween
Horrors
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No matter what the season |
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Our hearts they hit like thunder |
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Classified Section
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Special #1 10 leaves of our choice for $10 + shipping |
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Special #2
is a wonderful "Starter
Kit" to help get you started with a hybrid african violet of your
choice, one 4" pot, soil to repot, and enough fertilizer to make
about 5 gallons of fertilizer solution. ONLY $4.75 + shipping. Please note: Mahlen & Brenda want to remind you these specials are available to VioletReflections list members only and are not listed on their site. You would have to tell them you are a member of the VioletReflections mailing list to receive your bargain prices . http://www.violetgallery.com |
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With all the new varieties being added to your collections. You may wish for a way to help keep all your information organized. Our list member Will Cronk has written a fantastic program called "Stpaulia." He offers a full working demo version, for 30 days. Try it you'll like it. When you decide to purchase it tell him you are a member of VioletReflections. We have already met the criteria of the special price so your program would be only $20.00 (USA). Think about it, it works with the Master Variety List program and is a wonderful way to keep notes and pictures of all your violets. I use both programs, I would be lost without them. |
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Will Cronk Orders Sent To: |
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MailCleaner
is an e-mail add-on that hooks into your existing client and scans
for infected material. It will notify you of a problem, suspicion, or
virus directly and through e-mail for logging purposes. It is a
handy tool that works with Outlook Express and Microsoft Outlook. It sits
in your system tray to save resources and monitors everything that comes
in. Suspicion of a virus makes this program
excellent. If it suspects a virus, it will tell you right away to
avoid a possible mess, so enjoy the download, I know I did! |
Looking for a brave person to make an exchange at
this time of year. I don't want the season to stop. I hardly
need new plants, but I am addicted to swapping african violet leaves. Here
is the url to my african violet picture album http://members.spree.com/hysold/ Wanted, your favorite recipe for our Kitchen Korner. Wanted, bio's for future installments Next month we feature Rosemary McLean |
Would you like to be published? Do you have an announcement, a poem, or
have you discovered some information you would like to share with other
members? Send it to Sandy She
will
publish it here in the next issue of our VR-newsletter. Please watch
for the next issue to be released on the first Monday of the month. Wanted, poetry to publish here I believe most teenagers have tried to write a "romantic"poem If you kept yours over the years share one with us. |
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VR-monthly newsletter 
African
Violets
