I got a very cool African Violet Zhabo starter as a birthday gift to myself ☺️ I'm new to these, I've always wanted one since they are pet safe. My plant collection consists of mostly Hoya and Epiphytic Cacti.
I need to know the the substrate deal with these and if I need to use distilled water. I use Grow Queen organic fertilizer for all my plants at half strength every watering. My base for my potting mix is Coast of Maine Arcadia Blend (see photo) and then I usually add pumice and coco chips, I add extra lava rock to my chunkier hoyas. I don't like perlite and don't use it for personal reasons. Would a chunky mix work or should I just mix pumice with the potting soil? Would it even like coco chips? I live in a dryer Colorado climate if that helps. I don't want to mess this up, thank you in advance!
by shealyx1824
3 Comments
What’s your reason for not using perlite? Using African violet soil is always best since they need a certain ph mix that those soils tend to have already, and they’re also usually lighter soil mixes that can often have the appropriate fertilizer mix as well. Perlite is highly recommended because it helps keep the soil light and broken up for the roots, etc…and most people put in 1/3 perlite to 2/3 soil mix. Either way, that’s a beautiful new African violet you got there, and wishing you all the best with it!
Everything violets is located in Castle Rock Colorado https://m.youtube.com/@everythingviolets he posts lots of how to videos.
pumice is a fine substitute for perlite! but you should mix it with AV soil. someone somewhere may have a recipe for homemade, coir based AV soil? but it needs ph modification is the main thing, iirc.