Hi Begonia,

Those leaves in the center are not suckers, they are the crown of the plant, and should not be cut out. I looked at the plant in picture 003.jpg and I don't see any suckers on the plant.

With the most respect to you, you are worrying too much. Just grow your violets and enjoy them. If you do get a sucker it will become obvious because you will have two crowns on the same plant. At that point you can either destroy the sucker or plant it and make another plant. Before you do destroy the sucker it would be a good idea to show us a photograph again.

I hope this helps!

Larry

Hear, Hear!

Looked at all your pics - and yes - you have a nice bunch of Optimara varieties - the one on a pic 43.jpg is Optimara Colorado. No suckers on anything. And your worries regarding holes in your leaves - yep - watch for a caterpillar - and second leaf is probably a mechanical break - may be wind. Usually the advantage of growing plants outside is worth tolerating little nibbles by the bugs. And at the end of the summer - beware on what you are bringing back - you either let everything freeze - or seriously spray to debug.

I.

I had a feeling those were just leaves adding to the pretty crown. But I heard so much about suckers and how hard it is to identify them, and how they grow in the middle...that I cut those leaves off. Like an idiot, of course.

Will there be any serious consequences to the plant? Or is it simply that I managed to make the plant less lush and full for a while? Will new leaves grow back there?

Aaaarghh...maybe I should just leave them alone.
Not that it doesn't bother me that they no longer bloom like they did the first month or so after I brought them home from the nursery.

Now, three of them have no more flowers - maybe they took a rest from blooming. Only the fourth came up with a new blooming cycle but even this one is not as profuse as when I first got them.

I will experiment with disbudding on one of them, now that I have butchered them anyway...:-(((

Otherwise, still alive and well after almost 3 months.
It's something for a newbie. :-)

Thanks so much!

PS: I only meant to post the first two pictures.

Hi Begonia,

Glad we could help. The biggest reason for plant failure by newbies is not neglect but smothering them with love and attention. lol My other advise would be to only water the plants when they need it. Over watering is the biggest cause for death of African violets. Remember, they are not aquatic plants. I would say though that your watering is just fine. They probably would not be doing this well if you had been over watering.

Again, just sit back and enjoy. Violets are really quite hardy plants and easy to grow compared to many plants. Give them a few months to recover from the blooming cycle and see what happens with the blooming.

Good growing to you.

Larry

Yay you for keeping your violets alive! When you water, do you add a weak solution of a balanced fertilizer? They like that with every watering; it will help encourage more flowers.