{"id":3547,"date":"2021-11-22T07:43:21","date_gmt":"2021-11-22T15:43:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/?p=3547"},"modified":"2021-11-22T07:43:21","modified_gmt":"2021-11-22T15:43:21","slug":"baron-st-pauls-violets","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/baron-st-pauls-violets\/","title":{"rendered":"Baron St. Paul’s Violets"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"African<\/a>Like most couples, my parents compromised on various issues throughout their marriage.\u00a0 One of the most significant centered on flowers.\u00a0 My mother wanted flowers in the house 365 days a year.\u00a0 My father did not want to go broke providing them.\u00a0 The compromise, which took place before I was old enough to know about it, was that during the growing season, those flowers would come from my father\u2019s garden.\u00a0 At other times they would come from the lighted plant area in the basement of our house.\u00a0 On special occasions they came from the local florist.<\/p>\n

The plant area was a bench, about seven feet long and three feet wide, illuminated by overhead plant lights.\u00a0 As far as I know, my father built it himself, though he was not very handy with tools and had an absolute knack for making power tools sputter and die.\u00a0 The plant bench was very simple in design, which probably accounted for its birth at my father\u2019s hands.<\/p>\n

The bench was home to all kinds of indoor plants, but the most common by far were African violets, known to plant taxonomists as Saintpaulia ionantha.\u00a0 These days, African violets are cheap and ubiquitous, available everywhere from supermarkets to big box stores.\u00a0 Every once in awhile, I even see them in a special display at the local Quik Check.\u00a0 Many of those plants, especially the trademarked Optimara violets, come from the world\u2019s largest African violet supplier, Herman Holtkamp Greenhouses in Nashville, Tennessee.<\/p>\n

I don\u2019t know where my father got his violets\u2014probably from a local greenhouse.\u00a0 Most of them bore purple flowers, though I recall at least one with pink blooms.\u00a0 All were fertilized with a mixture that came in a purple glass bottle that lived by the plant bench.\u00a0 Those violets enjoyed cosseted lives in the cellar until bloom time rolled around, when they would be positioned in places of honor upstairs.\u00a0 When the petals fell they would be returned to the cellar to regain strength for their next above-ground appearance.<\/p>\n

The ancestors of modern African violets did indeed live on the African continent, in mountainous regions of today\u2019s Kenya and Tanzania.\u00a0 Though the flowers bear a superficial resemblance to those of members of the violet or Violaceae family, African violets are not related to them.\u00a0 They are gesneriads, belonging to the Generiaceae family along with other popular blooming houseplants, like streptocarpus and gloxinia.<\/p>\n

Like other gesneriads, African violets produce rosettes of evergreen leaves.\u00a0 Those leaves are rounded, somewhat fleshy and covered with soft hairs.\u00a0 The flowers are borne on slender stalks and have five petals apiece\u2014two upper petals and three, slightly larger lower ones.\u00a0 The petals may appear equal on many modern violet varieties.\u00a0 If you look at the flowers closely, you will notice that the petals\u2019 bases fuse into a tube, another gesneriad characteristic.<\/p>\n

In the nineteenth century, cradles of biodiversity in Africa, South America and Asia were rife with European colonizers, some of whom were keen amateur or even professional botanists.\u00a0 \"African<\/a>One such amateur was Prussian nobleman Walter von Saint Paul-Illaire, who, during the eighteen nineties, served as a bureaucrat for the German East Indian Company.\u00a0 Hiking through the Usambara mountains of eastern Tanzania, he discovered the low-growing plants that were eventually named in his honor.\u00a0 The baron sent seeds back to Europe and the saintpaulia craze began.\u00a0 It has not abated since.<\/p>\n

Because my father was such an avid African violet grower, I took the plants for granted.\u00a0 Now, long after his death, I find myself wanting them.\u00a0 Sentiment is an imperfect growing medium, so I am lucky that African violets are relatively unfussy and thrive in indoor situations where light is somewhat less than optimal.\u00a0 All you really need is a warm room, bright diffuse light and well-drained potting soil, as African violets dislike wet feet.\u00a0 Water only when the soil surface feels dry to the touch. The descendants of that purple bottle of plant food that my father used are still available in stores and still packaged in purple.\u00a0 Your African violets will appreciate regular applications according to manufacturers\u2019 directions.<\/p>\n

While choice is limited in most commercial establishments, the African violet world is full of options.\u00a0 Breeders have created large varieties that may be up to 12 inches in diameter, as well as minis that span only six inches. Trailing varieties, suitable for pedestals and baskets, are also available.\u00a0 Blooms may be single, double or simply appear as burst of exuberantly ruffled petals. \u00a0Flower colors range from white through pink, a host of purples, pale green and even yellow.\u00a0 Some varieties sport bi-colored petals and others feature variegated foliage.<\/p>\n

I was going to put \u201cAfrican violets\u201d on my Christmas gift wish list, but I will probably order a couple right now while the iron of inspiration is white hot.\u00a0 If you want to follow suit, try The Violet Barn, <\/strong>PO Box 9, Naples, NY\u00a0 14512; (585) 374-8592; www.violetbarn.com.\u00a0\"African<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

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Like most couples, my parents compromised on various issues throughout their marriage.\u00a0 One of the most significant centered on flowers.\u00a0 My mother wanted flowers in the house 365 days a year.\u00a0 My father did not want to go broke providing them.\u00a0 The compromise, which took place before I was old enough to know about it, … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4,6,2,3,1,5],"tags":[1010,1789,667,492,502,282,2619],"class_list":["post-3547","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-fall","category-general-interest","category-spring","category-summer","category-uncategorized","category-winter","tag-african-violets","tag-gesneriaceae","tag-gesneriads","tag-houseplants","tag-indoor-gardening","tag-indoor-plants","tag-saintpaulia-ionantha"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3547","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3547"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3547\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3551,"href":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3547\/revisions\/3551"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3547"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3547"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3547"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}