Mary Beth

Most probably it is a lost cause.

1. Not all suckers from a chimera come true to be chimeras.

2. Chimeras can sport back to the solid color - and one of the factors to make it sport is stress. It was not very strong to begin, then it suffered the shipment and summer heat and it was on the brink of death.

It doesn't hurt to wait for the next bloom but the chance is small...

Good luck

Irina

I agree with Irena. If it helps any, your situation is not unique. I just recieved two from a very "major and reliable source", and neither have bloomed true.

Chimera's are quite popular and I think many growers, even the "big names", are simply shipping every sucker they can get their hands on.

Rather than spend the time and money to nurture them long enough to acertain it is for certain blooming true, they rely upon the customer to tell them if it is not, and then, depending on the circumstances, they will offer to "replace it when you place your next order".

That is really sad to pay that kind of money for one that doesnt bloom true.I would like to know the name of the grower you got it from so I dont order from them..lyndon lyon says "All plants are guaranteed to bloom true"...dont all growers offer that?

Marigene -

It was basically in front of my eyes when the chimera changed bloom to solid - it bloomed true for a year - and now it is solid. I cannot blame the seller - it is the nature of the beastie. Very changeable.

Yes - the reputable chimera seller will wait until it blooms true - or sells at the reduced price the one that never bloomed yet.

The easiest chimera to grow is The Alps - I rooted suckers many times - and 25% come out solid white, very pretty. Never got solid pale blue yet.

Good luck

Irina

Sorry, it was Lyndon Lyon....They haven't said they won't replace them, and they haven't said that they will. When I called them they just asked me to wait and see if over the next couple of bloom cycles things improve. Frankly I think I'll just toss the plants.

I stupidly checked ok to substitute and added info telling them if they had many substitutions, to call me first. They didn't call and substituted almost my whole order except Irish flirt and one other commonly available plant. I figure they must be low on stock or something, but feel taken advantage of.

As far as the chimera's go they substituted Pony Ride with Concorde which is happily blooming away but is a solid purple/navy So not only did I not get Pony Ride, Concorde isn't even blooming true (not that I realy wanted it anyway) and the other chimera I ordered Blue Triumph is blooming (one flower) a striped light/dark fushia with no ruffled edges. Blue Triumph is supposed to be a pretty blue and white one. If shipping causes this sort of regressive sporting maybe waiting until spring when they don't have to use heat packs makes some sense.

They also substituted both of the yellow violets I ordered, Chantaspring and one other, with 2 identical plants of golden eye. So I am not very happy with them. I wound up with a lot of healthy plants I do not like.

Others have had good luck with them though, and since the plants did arrive healthy, bug free, well packed, and promptly, you may not want to write them off because of my one bad experience, although I probably will.

Merry Ann, Wow. What a frustrating situation. I can understand your distress about Lyndon Lyon. However, I just want to say that last spring I ordered Fire Dancer, Fancy Lady and Queen Sabrina, all of which have been blooming beautifully and true. My other, non-chimera plants from Lyndon Lyon have also been fine. I guess I'm due for a disappointment.
Judy

Judy, you may not be due for dissapointment. Reliable companies do slip up. They have done well for you in the past and have done the same for many others. I may just have gotten "lucky". Oh well, and onward.

Mary Beth I am sorry about your plant also. I actually watched some ebay auctions for Yukako. I think it is one of the more interesting and elegant ones. My question below does not mean that I don't think you should contact the seller and ask her for a new plant blooming true, or perhaps a replacement of nice quality non chimeric plants she CAN provide, or a refund, or whatever, and then look for Yukako from a more reliable source. I am only curious.

Can anyone who grows and propagates chimeras comment any more about the possible offspring of these sadly sported violets. If say my "Concorde" or Mary Beth's "Yukako" (which are now growing as solid sports) sprout a sucker- is there ANY chance that sucker will be the original named chimera variety, or has all hope of that been lost when it sported back to a solid color? (I am assuming here that the chimera did bloom true initially, at least for the grower, and is now no longer exhibiting chimeric qualities due shipping stress or whatever) If it posessed the DNA initially it still does right? Or not?

Thanks For the info so far. Just wanted you all to know that a Yukako plant was purchased for me as a gift from Lyndon Lyon and is healthy and blooming true. I'm going to contact the grower of the other plant to see what she'll do if anything. I guess I just learned a very expensive lesson!!!! I'll let you know what happens. Also just to let you know I purchased other plants from ebay some were very small( only with 3-4 leaves on them) so buyer beware!

Mary Beth, Congratulations on getting the chimera you wanted. I think it is sometimes best just to pay the price and replace the plant.

I too have had mixed luck with ebay. Some lovely, strong, little plants, some sad, small, sick ones, that went to the compost upon arrival. I order , I hope, I'll give anyone ONE chance. But if it does't work out, it's my last order with them. I don't waste a lot of time trying to recoup my losses. You can spend so much on shipping that your losses can multiply beyond reason, even if the plant is replaced for free. There are lots and lots of people out there, both commercial and non, that can grow a realy nice AV.

I have purchased Pony Ride also. I freind put me in touch with a local grower here. It is their hobby and they sell off extra plants as they have them by word of mouth. No shipping was involved to procure this plant "yay". It is a nice one, not only blooming true when I bought it, but blooming to beat the band. Very, very, cute plant. I gave it a place of honour in the living room window.

I'd still like to know a little more about how these destablize etc. I am slightly nervous this one will change,although it sure seems healthy enough.

Sorry for Concord turned solid blue - I think it is one of the most gorgeous ones, like WOW. Pony Ride - is a cute weed, trailer, grows easily, propagates easily -and I think it is a dropper - not a sticktite bloomer.

Sometimes you are lucky and sometimes not that lucky - but still - Lyndon Lyon greenhouse grows excellent plants, they created wonderful varieties - and now it is the end of the season - they do not ship in winter - so they possibly just ran out of some plants.

I am thinking that if you have a chimera that started changing to solid - means that the growing point of it already lost 2 types of tissue cells, chimera stalk if sliced will show 2 types of cells - let's say pale green and dark green - which will result in different color of the petal and stripe in the middle. If for whatever reason one of them takes over - the growing point will have only one type of cells - and produce solid flowers from the leaf nodes above the point of change.

What if to chop the top of this chimera leaving the lower leaves that already produced the correct bloom - and if will stimulate the growth of the suckers from the "chimera type tissue" - so there is a good chance that you can restart the proper thing.

I think it has a chance.

Irina

Thank you Irena, That was just what I wanted to know. I remember seeing directions with pictures on someone's website under proagation of chimeras. I'll lop Concorde's head off and let you know what happens. Nothing to loose. If by any chance I get two suckers that bloom true I'll send one to you.

Concorde is definitely a refined little plant, perky even, and makes a tidy rosette of neat little leaves all on it's own. Pony Ride has multiple crowns and suckers, but I love the gracefulness of it. It is like having spring wood violets blooming in my wintery window. I am glad it is so easy to propagate, maybe I'll soon have them all over the house.

I purchased some chimera on ebay this summer also. I was very lucky to get great plants. I only bid on ones that were larger plants that were in bloom. Some cost more money, some not so much, so it evened out. Some buyers don't guarantee their "starts" to bloom true, so I stayed away from that. Chimeras are selling for so much money on ebay, some sellers are putting them up for sale as soon as they can. Someone on this site said he'd never gotten The Alps to bloom true from a bloom stem. Of course chimera are known to change (is that why they're called chimera?, ha)so you have to keep that in mind. The Yukaho are getting a little less costly each year, so maybe next year you can get a better plant.

Also I had looked at Chimera at Lyndon Lyons, but I know most greenhouses sell starter size plants, and I really wanted something that's been blooming. When I made up my list of plants I'd wanted, I emailed my list to them and asked if the plants were in stock...I got a return email with a "yes" and "no" beside the names...the ones I wanted most were not available, so I looked to ebay instead. So next time you want to order, ask them first. Also..if you were disatisfied with the order, you should let them know why. Maybe they will offer some compensation. A lot of violet growers are no longer in business, Granger, Tinari and the few that are left have the competition from hobby growers on ebay. I would think they would be willing to have a return customer by working something out. It is always worth the chance to try.

That is interesting about cutting off the top of a chimera to see if it's suckers, or new crowns would bloom true. I haven't heard that before, I would think if it worked, someone would have written about it, but you never know. Can't lose anything by trying. And with a first bloom, I would wait and hope the next ones would be chimera...light, lack of light, temps, effect color/bloom, so maybe there is a chance the next bloom cycle would be better, don't toss a plant too soon.

Keep us posted on any results, good or bad. Take care and good luck....tish

This can be a controversial subject and one that is long overdue.

The problem is that folks continue to shop for chimeras off Ebay. Ebay is not going to stand behind the buyer on a bad transaction. You'll probably pay too much for a plant that is too small from a person that doesn't really have a clue what they are doing.

There are 2 vendors on line that sell violets (including chimeras) that are fairly well known. The problem is that they sell such small plants, may or may not have bloomed yet, and it takes forever to get your order - and the plant you really wanted may or may not be in the box! They don't stand behind their plants as well as they should. Case in point - I received a chimera that did not bloom true and notified them immediately. They stated they would replace. I waited months. Then I saw a charge on my credit card for $17.00 - and I hadn't purchased anything else from them. A few days later, here comes a box from them with my replacement plant. It was blooming true, but they charged me $17.00 for shipping it Priority mail! I had already paid for the shipping on the first plant that ended up being a NOID...this plant ended up costing me a fortune!

There are a couple new vendors on line that sell only chimeras that don't gouge and the plants are huge in comparison to the other vendors. (Google: African Violet Chimeras) Once they catch on, it may very well put an end to the Ebay business. (Let's hope!)

A chimera is an unstable plant to begin with. Let's face it - it's a mistake! The genetic code was altered and resulted in a striping bloom. The problem is, you can have a chimera that has bloomed true for years and suddenly without cause reverts to a solid. No stress, no change in environment.

The only solution is to propagate your plant while it is blooming true! You don't necessarily have to decrown in order to do this. Keiki a bloomstalk that is showing good health. Or even try potting a bloomstalk with a healthy leaf bract. These 2 methods avoid looking at a baren plant for months, and you still have viable clones that should produce at least 2 'spares'.

My personal opinion - don't trust Ebay! You are asking for trouble ..plants that don't bloom true or even a pest problem that wipes out everything you have! What's Ebay's motto? Let the Buyer Beware!

I think there should be a law that when you pay the price for a chimera, you should get a chimera at least on the second blooming since the first is not always what develops later.

When I sell chimeras I sell them without seeing them bloom first but I sell with a guarantee that the person will get a chimera or will get her/his money back.

Nancy

Nancy, that is a good policy, but I am in agreement with the poster above that simply replacing the plant doesn't realy make adequate amends.

This a the problem inherent in mail order transactions I think. The shipping cost is often a very signifigant portion of the money the customer pays. When you have to pay shipping a $20.00 plant becomes a $37.00 one. Add another 17.00 to ship a second time and it is a whopping 54.00. When a seller replaces the plant but not the shipping, the customer still has a pretty substantial additional amount just to get what they originally ordered and it makes that seller very costly to do buisiness with. I understand that sellers of african violets don't make enough profit to cover the costs of reshipping plants on a regular basis. The answer is is to not make the mistake initially, then no one is out of pocket to correct the error. It is no longer just the cost of a stamp.

If there is a major error on the first order or on any sort of recurring basis, I would much rather try a different hopefully more reliable supplier. Reliability. The confidence that you will recieve the exact item you wanted is as important to a buyer as getting paid is to the seller.

The subject of purchasing African Violet chimeras is a broad one. A chimera is a plant that is made up of two or more distinct genetic cell lines. This happens spontaneously in nature and frankly they are pretty unstable. I know that yet I also am charmed by them and have purchased a few from Ebay vendors with mixed results. Some happily were blooming true when I received them and have remained true. Some were small barely rooted suckers that remain frail and sickly looking after weeks of babying them to try to save them. There is a rush to sell them because the demand is high.

A surprising piece of information to me is that human chimeras can also occur. This happens when two fertilized cells combine early in a pregnancy. The scientists believe that if this had happened a few days later in the pregnancy, the birth would have been Siamese twins. I watched a program about this on the Discovery Health channel recently. In two different cases womenÂs DNA profile does not match as being the mother of their own children. The scientists finally found the second DNA profile after testing tissue from various other organs of the women. They showed some startling pictures of people with checkerboard colored skin and talked about other mixtures of male/female that I wonÂt go into. Anyhow it is pretty interesting.

Hello,
Just to let you all know I e-mailed the seller I bought the yukako plant from twice. Got failure noticed both times due to inactivity in mailbox. So I guess she took the money and ran!!! and I'm stuck with a $54.00n purple noid. Big lesson learned.
Mary Beth

Hi Mary Beth, I'm sorry to hear about your experience with Yukako. It is very frustrating when you don't get what you are expecting.

My advise to you in the future is if buying on ebay to purchase a plant that is shown blooming in the picture. There are a some growers on ebay that I have dealt with and trust so if you want to email me I would be happy to let you know who I trust selling chimeras or other named varieties.

By chance, what color are the leaves? Are they medium green? Or are they dark green? I knowingly bought a sport of Yukako with the opposite colors (green outside with a purple stripe, saw the plant in bloom) The leaves are dark green not the medium green that Yukako is known for.

If you are interested, maybe we can trade if you do not want the noid. Let me know and maybe we can work something out. I like to take chances with plants.

Dave
czdallasfan@yahoo.com

itsdeb (Deb?),

That is very interesting. I am glad my little twin grandbabies were born nice and separate. I couldn't imagine which one I'd give up- unless it's beyond nap time when I'd happily give up either (or both).

Are the named varieties slowly changing over time (I am not talking about sports here- but ones that supposedly bloom true). Depending on the sellers chosen parent plants is the width of stripes changing subtley, or color deepening/washing out or are the "true" ones pretty much alike independant of source? This is fascinating stuff.

Some chimeras are much more stable than others. The older varieties seem more stable than the newer ones as a rule of thumb.
One thing you should know when purchasing is how well (frequency) the mother plant bloomed true. If sellers aren't propagating the best of the best, then you are taking a chance. The more you get away from propagating a true bloomer, the more chance you have of coming up with a NOID.