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Since a Persian violet is finished after a couple of months of flowering, growing from seed is the sensible way to have plants without buying a new one every time. One packet raises far more plants than a household needs, sowings can be staggered so that flowering periods run on from one another, and home raised plants come into flower already used to your light and temperature rather than arriving from a warm, humid greenhouse and sulking for a fortnight.
The trade off is time. Allow five to six months from sowing to the first open flower, and expect the first eight to ten weeks to be slow going with very small plants that need consistent attention. Nothing about the process is difficult, but the seedlings are tiny and unforgiving of drying out.
Seed can be saved from your own plants by letting a few flowers set capsules rather than deadheading them, and collecting the dry capsules when they turn papery. Do this on a plant that is finishing anyway; letting a plant in full flower set seed cuts its flowering short, which is precisely what you spend the season preventing.
Sowing: surface sown, in the light, in warmth
Fill a shallow tray or a half pot with fine seed-starting mix, level and firm it gently, and water it thoroughly before sowing so you never have to water over the seed. The seed is extremely fine, close to dust, so sow it thinly on the surface and do not cover it at all. It needs light to germinate, and burying it is the single commonest reason a sowing fails completely.
To spread very fine seed evenly, tip it into the palm of one hand and tap that hand with the other while moving over the tray, or mix the seed with a pinch of dry silver sand and scatter the mixture, which lets you see where it has landed. Do not sow the whole packet at once; a small pinch fills a tray and the rest keeps for a later sowing.
Cover the tray with a propagator lid, a sheet of glass or a clear bag held clear of the surface, and keep it at 70 to 75F (21 to 24C) in bright but not directly sunny light. Direct sun under a lid cooks a tray in an hour. Germination usually takes two to three weeks, and the seedlings emerge as barely visible green specks, so check with a good light and do not give up too early.
| Factor | Target | Note |
|---|---|---|
| Sowing depth | None; on the surface | Seed needs light; covering it prevents germination |
| Germination temperature | 70 to 75F (21 to 24C) | Steady warmth matters more than a high peak |
| Time to germinate | Two to three weeks | Uneven emergence over another week is normal |
| Moisture | Surface just moist, never wet | Water from below or with a fine mist onto the compost only |
| Light at sowing | Bright, no direct sun | Direct sun under a cover overheats the tray fast |
| Growing on temperature | About 65F (18C) | Slightly cooler than germination, with strong light |
| Time to first flower | Five to six months | Depends mostly on light through the young stages |
The first month after germination
As soon as seedlings appear, start ventilating. Prop the lid open a little for a few days, then remove it, so the seedlings harden to normal room air rather than collapsing when it comes off in one go. At the same time, move the tray to the brightest place you have that is out of harsh direct sun, and let the temperature settle to about 65F (18C).
Light is the deciding factor now. Seedlings kept warm and dim stretch into thin pale threads within days and never make good plants afterwards, no matter how well they are treated later. If you are sowing in the short days of late winter, a simple grow light a few inches above the tray for twelve to fourteen hours a day is worth far more than any amount of extra warmth.
Keep the surface just moist. Very small seedlings die within hours of the compost surface drying out, and they damp off if it stays sodden. Watering from below, by standing the tray in shallow water until the surface darkens and then lifting it out to drain, gives the best control at this stage. Good air movement over the tray keeps damping off away.
- Ventilate as soon as the first seedlings show Open the propagator vents or prop the lid, and take the cover off entirely over three or four days. Seedlings left sealed in high humidity damp off and grow soft.
- Transplant at the first true leaves When the first pair of true leaves has expanded beyond the seed leaves, lift seedlings with the point of a dibber or a pencil and move them into individual cells or small pots. Hold a leaf, never the stem, which crushes easily.
- Set them at the same depth Plant each seedling so the seed leaves sit just above the compost surface. Burying the stem invites rot in a species already prone to it at the base.
- Pot up when roots reach the sides Move up one size at a time into a general purpose potting mix that drains freely, ending in a final pot of four to five inches (10 to 13 cm). Jumping straight into a large pot leaves wet compost around a small root system.
- Pinch the tips once before buds show Take out the growing point of each main shoot while the plant is still purely leafy. Side shoots break from below and the plant flowers as a fuller dome rather than a few tall stems.
Growing on to flowering size
Once in individual pots, young plants want bright light without scorching midday sun, temperatures around 65F (18C), steady moisture and a balanced liquid feed at half strength every two weeks. Growth is slow at first and then noticeably faster once the root system fills the second pot. Turn the pots regularly so plants build evenly rather than leaning towards the window.
The habits that matter later start here. Water thoroughly and let the pot drain completely, never leaving a young plant standing in water, because the base rot that kills mature plants kills seedlings faster. Keep plants a little apart rather than crowded, so air moves between them and damping off and gray mold have nowhere to start.
Buds appear about five to six months from sowing, and from that point the plant is treated as a flowering plant: cool and bright, deadheaded daily, fed lightly. A well grown home raised plant is usually sturdier and longer flowering than a bought one, mainly because it has never had to adjust from greenhouse conditions to a domestic room.
Sow twice, six to eight weeks apart, from one packet. The second batch comes into bud as the first is going over, which turns two short flowering periods into one long one and costs nothing but a second tray.
What to record from a sowing
Note the sowing date, the date the first seedlings appeared, the date you transplanted, the date you pinched the tips and the date the first flower opened. Also record the temperature you germinated at and whether you used supplementary light. Those few lines let you work out exactly how long the cycle takes on your windowsill.
Add a note on how many seedlings came up from the pinch of seed you sowed, and how many made it to flowering size. Most people sow far too thickly the first time and lose seedlings to overcrowding, and seeing that written down is what makes the next sowing thinner and better.