Herself's Houseplants

According to Texas A&M there are three types of critters that eat African Violets, chewing, sucking and nuisance.

Chewing pests can cause wilting of your plant, sever leaves, eat holes in the leaves or flowers or discolor the leaves or petals. They include: cockroaches, thrips, various larvae, foliage feeding beetles, snails, slugs and symphylids.

Sucking pests can cause wilting, sticky residue on plant, curl or stunt leaves, yellowing leaves or dead spots in leaves. They include: Cyclamen mites, broad mites, spider mites, aphids, scale, mealybugs ( foliar and soil ).

Nuisance pests annoy you but don’t hurt the plant. They include: pillbugs, earwigs, and springtails and black flies.

Use a pesticide to cure the problem. Your local nursery has many pesticides now rated for indoor and house plant use.

See also:
African Violets

Root Knot:

Symptoms: Galls ( knots ) form on roots.

Treatment: Not much unfortunately start a new plant from leaf cuttings.

Crown Rot:

Symptoms: Older leaves drop and as crown rot progresses younger leaves start to drop as well. Stems are water soaked and weak. Roots become brown and die.

Cause: over watering

Treatment: Sometimes fungicides can help. They can be found at your local nursery. Also get the plant out of the wet soil and into fresh, sterile soil. It is organisms that actually do the damage.

Botrytis Blight:

Symptoms: Small spots appear on leaves and stems. The spots will enlarge, often quickly covering the entire leaf. Flowers look faded. A close look might show gray fungus.

Treatment: none – remove infected plants before the blight can spread to your other plants.

Powdery mildew:

Symptoms: White filaments grow on leaves, stems, flowers, they will look like powder. It might only effect flowers.

Treatment: Use a fungicide available at your local nursery.

Petiole Rot:

Symptoms: Rust colored spots appear where stem touches pot or soil. The stem and leaf collapse.

Cause: Too much salt accumulation in soil. This means too much fertilizer.

Treatment: Repot in a fresh pot with fresh soil and go easy on the fertilizers.

Ring spot:

Symptoms: Rings appear on leaf surface, they might be white, yellow, or brown. Leaves affected eventually die.

Cause: Cold water touching the leaves

Treatment: Use warm water to water African Violets.

See also:
African Violets