 |
| Primulina 'Loki' grown by Scott in his office. |
If we wanted to design the perfect houseplant from scratch,
we would want it to be carefree with culture requirements similar to what we
humans like.
That would mean the plant would be adaptive to a wide range
of light, temperature, humidity and occasional lack of water. It would be decorative and have enough
interesting qualities to make it worth giving it some time and space. If it would flower occasionally, that would
be a bonus.
I gave my son a Primulina ‘Loki’ to see if he would have
success. The picture shows a good
looking plant with flowers. Even though
he grew up around my greenhouse business, even he would describe himself as a ‘non-plant’
person.
I interviewed him about his success:
Is this your office or apartment?
This is on my desk at the office.
Is it window light or only fluorescent?
Mostly fluorescent. The windows are open all day, but
my desk is probably 20 feet away, so it would be indirect most of the time, except
for briefly at sunset when the sunlight comes straight in horizontally.
Did it have buds on it when I gave it?
Not sure. I don't think so. Maybe they were hidden
under the leaves. I think the whole stalk/stem with the flowers on it grew from
"nothing" to 6 inches or so, surprisingly quickly.
Does it have a wick in it?
No.
How often did you water it?
Because the pot is suspended inside the silver container, I
found that when I water it, it all runs straight through the pot and the dirt
would dry out again while the water pooled in the bottom. So, I've been
trying to water smaller amounts every other day or so. Sometimes I take
the pot out and recycle the collected water through the pot again.
Have the other buds opened up?
There is another stalk with 3 more flowers on it. The
first ones from the picture have mostly died by now in the last two
weeks. I'll send a new picture.
His story shows that Asian Violets
are perfect houseplants and causal plant- tenders can have success with
Primulina.
No comments:
Post a Comment