I am thinking that the starter plant you got was waiting for the buyer way too long - and the lower leaves just got way too large for packing.

You give it a bit of rest and repot lowering the neck into the soil. It will send roots immediately - and it will give your Tomahawk a necessary boost.

They really respond to the fresh soil in happy way. I just read Dale Martens advice on Streps in "GesnerIads" magazine - and I bet it works with violets even better. Before you repot - she advises to leach the pot - so old soil gets flushed. One of my violet buddies uses a very weak solution of fish emulsion in distilled water for this purpose.
Run the cup or 2 of this mixture through the pot - and I bet it will rock afterwards.

Irina

I've read about fish emulsion in other threads, but what is it? Where can I find some? What are the benefits of using it? It sounds like a kickstart natural fertilizer.

Lun,

Fish emulsion is exactly what it sounds like-liquid fish. It provides both macro and micro nutrients. I use it to green up a variegated plant that is going too white. (A little trick I learned from Irina. Thanks!) It works like a charm.

You can get it anywhere you get fertilizers. It's a commonly-used organic fertilizer so it's fairly easy to find. At this time of year, the big box stores may not have it.

I mix mine with water and epsom salts and make sure I cap it when I'm finished. The smell is wicked but once you water your plants with it, you cannot smell it.

Linda

Just not let it sit after you made a solution - it will get ripe in a hurry - use it on other plants after you are done with AVs.

Thanks for explaining Linda, and that sounds like good advice Irina. I thought fish emulsion might be fish waste (I read on another thread aquarium water is very good for AV's). I used to have several fish tanks, but as the fish died off, I didn't re-stock, so they were drained and stand empty.

Linda, I have an Optimara clone that is growing much differently from its mother plant. The leaves are more pointed at the tips and wavy. Is it a nutrient deficiency or pH balance issue like "Dr. Optimara" suggests? It is the only plant that grows this way.

This is "Big Mama" (the closest match would be Georgia II)

And her daughter, "Drizella" (my little nicknames for them)

Sorry, I left out some information. The soils are the same, the fertilizer and water are the same. They were sitting right next to each other until I brought this one home to my nursery. There are no signs of pests, but I don't have a jeweler's loup (sp?), still, its isolated just in case. I just flushed and bathed it with lukewarm water. I don't know what else to do for it.

Lun,

Is your clone from a leaf or a sucker? Has it always been growing like this or has it changed?

I am leaning towards it being a sport. It doesn't look unwell and usually a culture issue will affect more than one plant.

How long has it been in this pot? (It's a little big but that wouldn't be an issue here.) A peat-based soil mix can go acid after a while affecting pH issues. In my experience, nutrition deficiencies will affect more than just one plant in a collection.

I would just keep it isolated, treat it as you do the others and see how it grows. I think it looks pretty healthy and it's a pretty plant!

Maybe someone else will have some thoughts.

Linda

P.S. loupe

((I thought it was loupe, but wasn't positive.))

No, it was in a bigger pot before, but I groomed some outer leaves off and potted it down. I just went to the local big box store looking for smaller pots, but all they had were 4" pots. The lady said they had smaller, but they didn't have any in stock. For now, I either have to get creative, or live with over-potted plants. I think that it was like this to begin with, but it seems more pronounced than when I separated it from the mother plant.

The potting mix is fresh because I just repotted it maybe a week ago. Like you said, it seems healthy, the leaves are green and it was blooming (until I snapped them off), but the leaves are just shaped differently than Mama. I will tell you that the root system is amazingly healthy. I was amazed at how large the root system was when I pulled it from the larger pot.

What did you mean when you called it a "sport"?

A sport is a sucker that comes from the same pot, but starts behaving differently when it flowers, so you could have two different color flowers on each side of your plant.

The 'sport' is just not a true copy, and may have mutated, or evolved into something else. It's genetics ... and some stuff, like chimeras are unstable and tend to 'sport'

I look for sports in my hosta all the time. If I can keep them stable for a few years, I can name them, register them. Usually, they revert.

dave

Lun,

Just curious-why did you disbud this violet?
And, I would quit worrying over it. It looks nice and healthy. It's just different-like Dave.

Linda

The flowers were looking very dusty and old. It just seemed like I should. The color was way off, almost brownish. I pulled so many leaves off that I think it put stress on the plant and the blooms were suffering.

It won't be long before it sends new blooms. It has never stopped blooming since I removed it from the mother plant.

((By the time I found it, I would hardly call it a sucker, but that is how it started, I just didn't know to groom it starting out. Big Mama is my very first AV and still doing very well. Although, she is being groomed frequently now.))