I have been growing violets for more than 10 years, but I encountered such a misfortune for the first time a few years ago. A month after the unbearable heat, the leaves began to die off en masse. With tears in my eyes, I threw them out in armfuls. In order not to destroy the entire collection, I began to look for ways to save myself in different sources and come up with my own. As a result, only a few varieties were irretrievably lost. I want to share my experience: maybe it will be useful to someone.
What is vascular bacteriosis and how to deal with it
In the heat of senpolia, vascular bacteriosis affects — an insidious disease that can destroy all plants in a matter of days and even hours.
It manifests itself in the mass death of leaves. Translucent spots appear on the plant, first on the old leaves, and then on the young ones. They darken, glaze over, become slimy and die.
It’s important to know
Vascular bacteriosis in senpolias actively begins to develop with the onset of heat and primarily affects plants that suffer from improper agricultural techniques to one degree or another. Therefore, in order to prevent the instantaneous development of the disease, it is impossible to allow the temperature to rise above +30 ° C in the room where the senpolia are located.
In addition, it is required to observe certain measures for the care of flowers:
- In April–May, transplant the plants into a light nutrient substrate so that they have time to take root well before the onset of heat. The pot should have several drainage holes. Its diameter is selected in the ratio 1/3 of the diameter.
- During the transplant, it is worth putting a cord in the pot for wick watering. It will come in handy when you have to leave urgently in the hot season, and there is no one to take care of the flowers.
- Do not get carried away with top dressing, the excess of which clogs the vessels of the root system. This disrupts the circulation of moisture in the roots.
- It is impossible to allow compaction of the soil in which senpolia grow. The caked substrate does not allow air to pass to the roots, and they begin to sour, which contributes to the development of vascular bacteriosis.
My methods of saving violets
1. Reduce the temperature and increase air circulation
The most effective way to fight is to lower the temperature and increase air circulation. I didn’t have the opportunity to put an air conditioner on, so I had to use a fan. In the freezer, I froze water in plastic bottles and laid them out between plants on the shelves of the rack, this allowed me to lower the temperature at least a little.
2. We treat Saintpaulia with drugs
To increase the resistance of plants to adverse conditions, I sprayed them with a biological immunostimulator, which is obtained from plant raw materials at night once a week, avoiding an alkaline environment, that is, the water should be slightly acidified, for example, with citric acid.
Watering with a microbiological preparation designed to protect vegetable gardens at the stage when violets were already significantly affected, did not give noticeable results. In my opinion, this is a good remedy, but it is more suitable for prevention, so I shed plants with it about once a month. And I needed a stronger remedy. On the Internet, I found a tip — to water violets with a solution of trichopol. I decided to try: 1 tablet of trichopol is dissolved in 2 liters of water and watered 1 time in 10 days. To my great joy, the leaves on all the rosettes stopped dying! If I had learned about this method earlier, I think many losses would have been avoided.
My windows face southwest, so it gets very hot in the rooms after lunch. To cool the lamps on the shelves, I turn them off from time to time, if it’s very hot, I turn them off completely, and I lower the sockets from the upper shelves to the floor. I cover the windows with white paper. By the way, I noticed that the violets that stood on the windows suffered many times less than those that were on the shelves, although it was hotter on the window.
I also noticed that gloxinia tolerate heat much better than saintpaulies. In equal conditions, none of them suffered, although they bloomed, of course, worse than usual.
Now I already know what to do with the onset of heat, and I hope that my pets will feel good.