I'm an idiot who tries to rescue clearance plants all the time. Have beautiful rose bushes, lilac bushes, lillies, cactus.. All different kinds of stuff. But these babies are a mess! Gotta try though! Thank you for the input!

Those are 100% better than the ones I got at Walmart back in 2006. I paid $6 for 15 pots of dead looking violets in November. They had been hosing them off every day, so they were down to a stem and stiff soil in most cases. First thing I did was drop them into a 50/50 mix of milk and water about half way up the pots. Of course the soil floated but eventually it saturated. I poured a little watery milk on top and used the milk to water them for the next several months. All but 3 of them came back to become flowering plants. Those 3 died almost immediately - like before Christmas.

About the same time my wife got a couple violets and cared for them in her way. After a month or two she came to me with one of the plants covered in white fungus. I watered it with my milk mix and the disease disappeared in a couple days. The plant lost the bottom leaves but lived, and life went back to normal.

I realize that using milk on African violets flies in the face of all y'all professional violet growers, but it was an experiment for me to demonstrate the antifungal qualities of milk in an organic garden care program. Most of you simply discard diseased plants. I take them on as a project. I think getting 12 out of 15 plants to revive is pretty good.

Wow!! Well these are my first... I will try what ever I can! Thank you for the input!

hedhntr71, please let us know how it goes. Everyone is interested.

Yolanda

Well, almost a week and I think they look better. Not sure when to re-pot them. They are actually sturdy now. They seem to like that window. It faces east, and not real hot. Sorry for the individual pictures and not a "group shot". Didn't want to move them!

Wow! They look much better!

You probably can start repotting the strongest ones soon. The soil they are in needs to be replaced. Needs more perlite. The one they are grown is mostly peat. It gets too dense with time - roots need to breath.

Do they need bigger pots or about the same size? Or do they like a small pot?

Stacy good for you for saving their little "lives" ! I try all the time. But I think now, if it were me, I would take them out of their pots and scrub those pots really well with warm soapy water. I would take off any outer leaves that are broken or just out of symmetry. (haha and yes,,,go ahead and root them!) I would gently shake of as much excess soil as I could so I can repot them (in their same clean pots) with as much fresh soil as I can. Make sure you use a good mix with a good amount of additional perlite in it. Gently water, and make sure you let it sit in the saucer for about 20 min. so they soak up any water they missed. Then drain. You should be good to go !!!! Can't wait to see them bloom !!!!! Good luck--Rosie

Smaller pots if possible. The ratio is about 1:3 - diameter of the pot to the span of the leaves.

You can root the "pulled off" leaves!!?? Really!!!? How do I go about that?

Oh Stacy so easy. Once it puts up flowers from the very bottom row it will never bloom from that row again. Eventually as the plant grows from the center and you repot it, you will gently cut off that bottom row or two of leaves. Hmmm, what to do with a bunch of leaves??? Get a very sharp knife or razor blade, give each leaf a fresh cut leaving about 1 1/2 inches of stem, put it in a small pot (I use Kcups) or community pan (if you have a bunch) and tend them like you would any other cutting. Eventually little babies will sprout ! And you will be doing the happy dance !!!!! Good Luck !!!! Rosie

Keep us posted on progress! I recently got two clearance violets from Wal-Mart.. I know they are "just optimaras" but I love bringing them back from the brink and then gifting them. ;)

dchall_San_Antonio - how fascinating! I've heard about using milk in, say, your eye when it's inflamed and itchy... But never heard about the plant idea. intriguing. :)

dchall--Same with me,,,,never heard of using milk for anything but drinking. Would like to know more about this. Maybe start a new thread with more info???

And Sue I guess that is just the caregiver in all of us ! Rescue, rescue, rescue !!!!! Rosie