Willow wrote:

snip

Have you seen the range of African Violets available? I recently saw a
display down the local shopping center! It's amazing the range of sizes,
colours etc that these things come in.

--
Wanda

Yes! My favourites are the intensely pink, waxy tiny flowers on the
miniature trailing varieties! Some of the flowers can look like
tightly-packed roses while others have wildly variegated foliage and
smaller or more insignificant flowers. You really need to contact a
breeder of African Violets in order to get any idea of the variety of
plants available - you certainly won't see a fraction of the diversity
if you only look in ordinary nurseries!

FWIW, your basic violets (ie. _Viola_ species) can be interesting to
collect, too! I have about half-a-dozen varieties filling my side lane
with their glorious scent and am on the lookout for a local-ish nursery
that sells non-mainstream violets. Violets like shady spots and are
remarkably hardy, spreading quickly to fill an area with tightly-packed,
deep-green foliage. I've found that snipping off the foliage just before
flowering will yield many more blooms (and makes it a lot easier to pick
out the rotten snails and slugs who love to dine on your violets when
you're not looking!)

One year, my kids made some really nice pot pourri by hanging bunches of
violets upside down for a few weeks and then stitching them into net
bags.

Oh, and BTW, ordinary violets are called _Viola_, but African Violets
are _Saintpaulia_ spp. Just in case you wanted to look them up... :-)

--
Trish {|:-}
Newcastle, NSW, Australia