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Re: INDOOR-GARDENING digest 616

Dee2540@aol.com wrote:
> 
> Hi everyone:
>      I am back again with a not so bug problem.  I have an African violet and
> have had several before this one.  When this violet was bought it had
> beautiful flowers on it that lasted for quite some time.  They have never
> bloomed again.  I have tried everything from fertilizers, fish emulsifiers, to
> a rusty nail placed in the soil.  How can I get this violet to bloom short of
> singing it to sleep at night?  It is in a Northeast window with the blinds
> halfway down to shade it.
>      I would appreciate any words of advice.  Also I have heard of a new
> growing medium of gel consistancy instead of soil for plant growing.  Anyone
> hear of it.  It is being manufactured in Texas.
> Dee


It's probably not going to flower in a shaded Northeast window.  It
needs more light.  You don't need to shade a north or east window in any
case, really.  The thing you want to shade most houseplants from is full
afternoon sun, and north and east windows don't get any full sun after
about 11:30 am.  The indirect light that comes in a north window doesn't
need to be filtered or shaded.  

Flowering house plants fall into two groups: light-influenced and
temperature-influenced.  African violets are light-influenced bloomers. 
They need a certain number of hours of a certain level of light every
day to bloom and keep blooming.  That's why they work so well under
fluorescents.  I'd move the plant to a more eastern or even a western
window.  I'd filter the west window, though.  I don't think you need to
actually shade, just put a sheer fabric curtain in between the plant and
the glass.  That should cut down the intensity enough to make the plant
comfortable but not so much that you defeat your purpose in putting the
plant in that window.  An east or southeast window, though is probably
best.  My violet is in a southeast window (in a candy jar terrarium,
though) and is starting to put out buds after being almost destroyed by
an attempt to remove suckers about four months ago.

Good luck!
-- 
Jim Gray 
Quality Assurance, Tipton
jjg2@c-cor.com
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