Yikes! You must be rather upset about the state of your greenling - I know I would be.

The experts may have different opinion (I'm just a lover / hobby grower, so take my opinion with a spoonful of salt) but I wanted to reply since I thought you might be feeling anxious.

If that was my plant, I'd make sure it had moisture - the top of the soil looks partly wet and partly dry - so I'd water it in to ensure the roots have soil around them and then bag it in a gallon baggie and set the sealed baggie in a window with lots of light.

I received a violet in the mail that endured much what yours did - it got all beat up in shipping and came mostly out of it's pot. I let it sit over night and it looked much like yours, so the next day I repotted it, watered it in, and it recovered nicely. I have a shelf with lights where mine lives but if I didn't I'd have put it in a windowsill with plenty of light (not SUN).

Good luck and hopefully someone with more knowledge will reply to you soon.

Lauren,
How does your violet look by now? This photo does show some shock, I think, but hopefully it has come out of it after a few days.

Sue

If the leaf stem is snapped, cut it back as far as you can to the base of the plant. I think you have enough leaves intact that it will survive. You can put the leaves you cut off in a small vase with water. They will root. You can pot them up and have more plants.

I do suggest to remove 1-2 leaves, soak in room temp water with a pinch of sugar for a hour then trim stem and pot them in soil/perlite incase plant does not pull through.

Other than that I'd probably water plant, making sure soil is evenly moist but not soggy. Baggie the plant and place where it will get bright indirect sunlight or under a fluorescent light fixture.

Best of luck

Thank you for all the advice! In the end, I managed to keep my poor little violet alive until February! But then we got about 6 inches of snow that stuck around for weeks, and a fresh 6 inches as soon as the first one finally melted. Unfortunately, the southeastern side of our house is unheated, so all the best windows were too cold. I'm thinking I'll have to find someplace to put a fluorescent light and try again. And maybe get my next violet over the summer, so it has a chance to settle in before winter hits us. I did try to take one cutting, but it died too. Thank you for the advice though.

cdnanon

Thanks for posting about the "pinch of sugar." I was wondering if AV's were plants that responded to sugar for transplant shock. It would appear that the AV's are.

Lauren

I am sorry about your troubles. There is always another AV and another day. When I first came here, it was because I lost my plants to various causes. After a bit of tea and sympathy from the good folks here I started growing AV's. Now, I almost have too many. (I say "almost" because there is no such thing as too many AV's :)

I keep my AV's in a northern window and they bloom like crazy.

How far south do you live? I'm in West Virginia, so I'm about 45 degrees from the equator. Southern windows get more light. Plus, my house is at a 40 or so degree angle from North, so none of our windows are actually facing any of the directions on the compass rose. My room has an East-Northeast-ish window with an air conditioner, and a North-Northwest-ish window with a 4 inch sill over my bed. The eastern window gets more light, but the air conditioner blocks it. But there's no way to put a plant at the other window without putting it right up next to the glass, which is way too cold in an Appalachian winter with only a small space-heater for the room. We have some great windows on the more southern side of our house (the living room even has skylights!), but ever since our central heating failed that part of the house has been unheated.

Hi Lauren,
I would be in zone 6b... so maybe our winters are similar! Our house is heated though... so I don't know how you would work with that. The windows in our house are new, so they are cool to the touch, but the room is just as warm right beside them as away from them. I'm grateful for that! I have violets at my east window and at my south window that has a sheer between my violets and the window.. and the violets are equally happy in both places. Maybe you should research a house plant that is small and likes cold temps. Doesn't the Streptocarpus (which is an AV cousin) tolerate cooler temps?

Don't give up! Maybe some day the heating will get fixed in your home and you can try again! AVs really don't tolerate cold temps very well.