African Violet Buds!

[Gthumbz89]

Mine have bloomed multiple times a year whenever they grow a wee bit taller. it helps them to bloom if you keep up with the trimming of bloom sucking suckers. Violets get sexually frustrated when they don't get pollinated so they make babies asexually kinda like phals and keikis. It's best to cut those off for a good bloom again. If you feed them lightly with 1/4 strength orchid ferts with every watering following a flush with plain water they go nuts.

Another way to be lazy with them is to pot them in 50-75% perlite and 50% Peat moss with a wick running through the soil into a reservoir (deli cups with a hole cut for the wick works fine). do a youtube search for AV wick watering for more detailed instructions. Doing that I only have to worry about filling up the deli cups twice a month. My violet loves this treatment.

[NYCorchidman]

Originally Posted by RandomGemini

Thanks! Do you happen to know how often I can expect them to bloom? Mine bloomed at around Christmas and just recently all of the flowers died back and now they seem to be growing lots of leaves. I was under the impression that AVs bloom more continuously than this.

African Violets will bloom non stop as long as the light is sufficient and the temperature is at optimal range (18-27C).

You can tell if they are getting enough light by looking at the leaves. They should be turgid and show some shine as shown in your pictures above, and stay in the tight rosette shape.

Mine bloomed non sotp except for the summer when it gets too hot. End of summer, they would start blooming again until the next summer.

[RandomGemini]

I was a little worried because I remember someone had said that they bloom pretty much constantly and mine haven't had new buds for a couple of weeks, but I noticed today that they are starting to bud again. The light direction has changed and it's warmed up a bit outside, so I had to move them back to where they are a bit closer to the window.

[NYCorchidman]

When people say "constant bloom", a couple of weeks' absent does not really count.

While they do bloom literally non stop when they really get going (you can see under the leaves that there are so many buds of various sizes ready to bloom in turn), sometimes they may take a very short break while the next buds get ready.

They are sensitive to temperature, so too cool or too hot means no flowers.

Light should be enough at all times of course.

[RandomGemini]

So they were just taking a break, I see. I hope I get another good show this time. I'm really liking these guys. So much easier than my orchids. My phals are almost as easy, but I do like having something in bloom all the time, so it's nice to have plants that bloom a lot.

I've got a mini phal that put up a spike for me a couple of months ago and I have two buds on it that I have been checking on daily to see if they will open... and it's been a couple of weeks! I'm going nuts with waiting. It's almost been a year since I've seen blooms on this little phal.

[NYCorchidman]

I love AV as well, but often they come with thrips on the flowers. I think almost all of them!!!

I no longer grow AVs. What a shame!

They are amazing little plants though. They offer amazing variety of colors and looooong blooming season.

[RandomGemini]

You're making me afraid for my orchid collection. LOL!

I had one that I tossed due to aphids and some unexplained browning on the leaves of one of my AVs. I'll check it when I get home tonight.

Have you also found thrips on AVs that you have ordered from an african violet nursery?

[NYCorchidman]

I have always bought AVs from local florists or HD.


Well, it is easy to check for the presence of the thrips on AVs, well, for the darker colored ones at least.

Take a good look at the center of the flowers. If you see dusty white stuff (pollen) scattered around on the petals near the center where the yellow stamen (the male part of the flowers), keep looking to see if you see any light to slightly dark brown colored little things crawling around at the center of the flowers. They are the larvae of the brown flower thrips.

I was told by other AV growers that you can pick the infested flowers to easily remove the bugs.
I do not like that because I want to enjoy flowers. lol
I mean in the long run, probably alright, but removing the flowers on the plants I just bought and the possible spread onto my orchids are just not worth it for me.

When I move to a bigger place in the future, I would definitely get a room dedicated for AVs.

My favorites are dark blue violets, dark blue with frilly white edge, light blue, and purple.