HI Ken, I just reread your original message and realized that I hadn't answered it. As for fertilizer, I have been using a combination of fertlizers. I have been using Optimara fertilizer which has no urea nitrogen and also alternate it with Dyna-Gro grow formula which is also sans urea. I like both of them very much and have been using them successfully for years. The only problem I have ever had was with Dyna-Gro which is a liquid and eventually it evaporates somewhat especially if you use small amounts. When the liquid evaporates it makes what is left stronger so you may have to adjust the amount that you disolve in the water. I now buy the smallest bottle and it has solved the problem of evaproation over a long period. Glad to hear your surgery went well. Fred in NJ

So ... you're looking to give your plants 10-12 hours of sunlight ... or fluorescent light or LED light ... per day. I keep my plants blooming with a combination of window light and fluorescent light. You can use cheap desk-lamps with CFL or LED bulbs. The light source (and/or window) should be no more than 1 foot away from your plants. P.S. To start a new thread, select the appropriate discussion category (in this case, African Violets) and start a new question/comment ... Desk-lamp CFL bulb

It's very cool. The seedlings may not be true to the mother because we don't know who the father is. Seeds take longer to come to the point of blooming plants than leaves. Based on the color of the blossoms, the new plants may be pink or purple or fantasy like the parents, they may have the wavy edged to the blossom. African violet folk have all the genetics of dominant and recessive genes down pat. You could get 50 seedlings, grow them all to bloom size and have a lot of different varieties of plants. So it is quite interesting because you don't know what you'll get.

The Forbid label had all sorts of warnings about human toxicity through inhalation, direct skin contact, etc. Birds are extremely sensitive to airborne particles and chemical fumes, even those that don't bother humans (fumes from teflon-coated nonstick pans, for example, can kill birds in a matter of minutes), and in general, it's pretty safe to assume that anything in the air that's harmful to humans will be more harmful to them. I didn't think it was worth the risk, even in a different room. Plus I'd have to worry about getting the overspray on my floor/wall/etc. What I did do is made about a half gallon of Forbid and, with my gloved fingers holding the soil/plant in the pot, dunked each of my plants (I have ~30, so not as many as a lot of people) upside down and swished them around for a few seconds. Saran wrap probably would have helped, but unfortunately I didn't think of it or see your comment in time, but just using my fingers worked relatively well. I did have one plant fall out of the pot and entirely into the miticide, but I fished it out quickly, and after letting it dry out overnight, I repotted it with apparently no harm done. Garbage bags covered with a layer of paper towels worked well to set the plants on while they all dried overnight in my bathroom, with the vent on to get rid of fumes. The miticide got a little dirty by the last few plants, due to some loose soil falling in, but I don't think it impacted its function any. I do need to figure out how to dispose of the leftover, though. However, that would have been a problem even if I had chosen to spray it, since I wasn't sure how much I needed, and it's not stable once mixed up, so I couldn't have saved it to reuse. I currently have it sealed in a cleaned milk jug while I figure out how to responsibly dispose of it. Thank you all for your help and advice while I figured this out! Hopefully this will be the last of the nasty mites!