I found a nursery that has a small but very diverse selection of mini's, variegated, girl leaf, but all pink/purple doubles. I did get one plant with thin edge tommy lou variegation but not in bloom. Mystery plant.

I was looking for a very good, unusual white but I did find one very plain white single, poss Optimara at Home Depot with just a tinge of pink. There were AV's that had upper white petals and lower dark pink so this may be a white version of those, with the one I bought only a more pure white because of temperature or sport. Still looking for a very good white variegated or plain star.

I don't have shelf room for one more fairly plain BBS noid but I just can't pass up an AV so I have that white, and it may have thrips. It is in isolated isolation, and will remain in isolation for a very long time.

I am not going to look up denver doll and persian prince ... I am not going to look up denver doll and persian prince ... i am not .... i have NO MORE shelf space! Maybe glass blowing or forming molten glass into shapes might be a new hobby. Some plant folks take that up. I saw some cool creations at a plant show last year. They were unique, but not too many people where buying them, people were mostly buying plants. I will try to post a photo of two small vases I bought.

I'm trying something new - just set up a few trays of small plants/plantlets for mat watering, using a cut up acrylic blanket. I've damaged wee ones like this in the past by letting them dry out too much between my top-watering sessions. I don't do well keeping their tiny pots evenly moist, hence the matting. So far, they all look very happy in their trays. I think, though, that because this is a new system for me and I'm nervous, that I am checking on them way more often than ever before. If I had been this attentive *before* I started using the mats, I'd probably not have needed to mat water, LOL.

Anne

Karin

I have a fantasy blue/violet single flower AV and I acquired a possibly washed out bi-color pink/white AV.

So..I was pulling spent blossoms off the blue/violet, I call it Bleu Velvet noid and I have some good flowers on the white, I call it Phoenix White, noid.

I got an idea to split the pollen sacks on the fantasy blue and dust the pollen over the white flower, whatever that spike is called, the pistel?

Anyhow, I believe I pollinated that white just fooling around.

Is it really that easy? I couldn't really tell where or how to apply the pollen which I only saw as a very fine dust. I guess I will know in a few weeks.

I didn't mean to do this..just all the ingredients were there and..like all casual sexual encounters..It Just Happened or I hope it did..

Now I wait a few weeks, see if it took.

Since I want fantasy, should I have used the fantasy as the seed parent instead of using the fantasy as the pollen parent?

I always found polinnating the easy part. Keeping them alive and happy afterwards is harder.

As for the genetics, look up Jeff smith's notes, I don't recall exactly, but I think its only variegation that doesn't come through the pollen parent...

Karin

Thank You!

The white noid, aka Phoenix White, is a sturdy BBS specimen so perhaps it will not be too hard to maintain. However, I routinely groom off spent blossoms so the Botheration Pestie aka me is a serious hazard to all AV's.

I am more concerned about what I am going to do with all the plants if I do get seeds and then, what? a hundred plants..O my

The Phoenix White looks to be either a chimera or a washed out bi-color and the purple, aka Bleu Velvet, is a fantasy so perhaps I have a good chance of interesting flowers. I looked at some of Jeff Smith's notes but couldn't find anything about fantasy. I hope you are right and the pollen parent will pass on the fantasy.

Lucky, if I am understanding this right, then fantasy actually appears to be a dominant trait :-)

And it is variegation that is dependent on the seed parent.

If your pollination doesn't take, try raising the humidity.

And you'll have 4-6 months to create space for future babies ;-) (assuming you are planning on growing that seed pod, not storing it)

K: pictures? You want some wine bottles? my wife is a … connoisseur … of the stuff. ha!

dave

LOL, i am treading a fine line with bottles to "decapitate" since my husband and i make wine. got three carboys going - apple, pear and a red.... so i need to keep some... ugh, 60 bottles intact.

here's a cut wine bottle with my improvised bottle cutting jig:

i haven't finished sanding it - because i've been playing with plants instead...

for example, my moss garden - no clue what that fossil is, i've found four of them so far:

then my container gardens with av's. not sure if any of them are good enough to lug to the show in 6 weeks time...

white bougainvillea with pixie blue, pixie runaround sport and petite blarney. moss is barely showing as of yet, and i doubt i'll see any blooms on the violets any time soon:

then we have a pink bougainvillea with jersey girl trail, little crystal, and alan's fallen angel (because trail along croaked):

stone slab with moss, palm stuff and fairy fountains:

and my newest, little creek, lemon fern and a cute copper container i found at the beach - the plan is to have copper pennies spilling from it into a penny pond :-)

like i said though, they all have a lot of growing left to do, and the moss is sooo slow.

maybe i'll just enjoy them for myself....

Wow, they are beautiful! Maybe you could find miniature pennies at a children's toy store where the store might have play money so that the scale is correct. Or perhaps copper foil, you could cut little rounds. All very beautiful and impressive. Hope that you enter them all, you will surely win some ribbons. Each one is unique.

Thanks, lucky, I looked at sheet moss, but it ships from across the country....

Instead, I collected some from outside (with permission of course), on a day it was just slightly below zero, but it appears any moss brought indoors goes through a stage of white fuzzyness, before slowly growing green. My best result so far was a handful of blackened dry moss I scraped off a rock - turned green after a day. Fascinating plant really.

Joanne, I wasn't so worried about scale really, but did consider spray painting the pennies golden (Canada took pennies out of circulation last year, but someone just gave me a (small) bagful, so I was thinking it would be a neat thing to use some...)

Yes, if they are out of circulation.

Hello, this is my first time. Saying anything here. I heard that if you put moss in a blender with buttermilk and blend then spray it where you want it to grow and then keep it moist you will have success. I heard it on Ralph Snodsmith's, the garden Hotline, and was intrigued but never tried it.

I read those recipes, though apparently you only need the buttermilk/yogurt/beer/whatever when "painting" the moss smoothie on inorganic material. On soil, you can apparently just blend it with water.

Still, once you chop it that finely, it takes a looooooong time to grow....

Karin, If you are still reading, I just purchased 3 Optimara Natalie, they look like Rebel's Night Breezes, only a smaller shape. The flower is very dark blue-violet with a frilled picot edge. We are in the process of moving. "Everyone" who comes to help wants to filch a leaf off of Rebel's Night Breezes. (Maybe because it is blooming its fool head off.) I also picked up another blooming MyDelight. So, the helpers can have their own version and my plant can keep her leaves. The plant store also had a batch of traditional solid purple pansies in various shades, and many bi-colors in shades of pink, mauve, maroon. Our new house has a spare room to use all for plants and be able to close the door. The back yard is large enough to add a greenhouse, perhaps someday. This is a happy upgrade for my plants. I thought they were having to go into adoption or foster care, but now they can continue to lounge around like lazy teenagers, eating, sleeping until noon, but not willing to bloom. Joanne

Joanne

That is good news, that you can keep your plants. A greenhouse would be Great.

Sounds like a great place, Joanne!

I just picked up what was identified as "probably Natalie doing her funky thing". Love it!

I have a daughter Natalie and she needs this Natalie violet. The pictures are just like her., some times she has a lot of color and sometimes she is not as colorful.

hey, gang!

i finally broke down and got 2 named varieties ;)

Rita Hilton - has a very vivid purple-violet cast and very large flowers!

and it is variegated too - my first.

and here's russian Mermaid's kiss - with a very nice green edge.

MK seems to be very prolific - it's still producing flowers 2 months later...lots of them!

Both are very beautiful. Thanks for posting the photos, as I have wondered about both of them as I like double pinks.

The O Natalie is probably easy to find in stores this season. I found three, as compared with only one of the MyDelight, so it might be easier to find. It is easy to spot because the flowers are star shape, not the more common pansy shape. Mine are all singles. Looks like you got some interesting variations, Karen.