Janice asks Annie:
Q Hi Annie,“My plant of Allegro Appalachian Trail sent up a flower stalk with an added bonus of leaves on the stem. I’ve never seen this happen before. Is this normal for a trailer? What would happen if I cut it and put it into soil?”
It doesn’t happen all the time, but some varieties do have leaves on the blossom stems! It’s normal for both trailers and single-crown plants. you absolutely can attempt propagation with it. I have not had any luck with this method but many folks do. It is widely used to propagate chimeras that will not come true from a propagated leaf (that’s why they are so spendy!) Here is a link to an article on The Violet Barn website that talks about propagating by blossom stem.
Small leaves on a blossom stem are sometimes confused with suckers – they are NOT suckers. That’s one of the reasons why the Judge’s Handbook says that we must wait until we see four leaves before identifying a sucker.
I hope this helps, Annie :-)
If you have a question about African Violets that you would like answered, you can submit it at Ask Annie!
It was something new for me. I did try to propagate it, but it didn’t work. Don’t know what the key is to succeed, but it’s not as easy as putting a leaf down. I can understand much better as to why chimeras get the hefty price tag. :)