How To Propagate/Multiply African Violets

Our Steemian sister @ewkaw thought me most of what I know about African violets and she's also responsible for my addiction :D

Today I want to show you the result of a highly questionable at first, but very successful propagation at the end.

It all started at the end of August last year, when I went to a local supermarket and saw some dark pink African violets and although I don't like pink, this pink looked amazing. (This is the plant from the supermarket, looks very neglected but that's not my fault.)

Anyway, I thought I'd rather steal a leaf then buy the whole plant :D Yeah, I know, it's not the nicest solution but it's the cheapest and besides, Reduce, Reuse, Recycle , right? So I started to look for a healthy, big leaf and saw a leaf fallen off, already detached from the plant, withered and half dead already. Taking a leaf like that can hardly be called stealing since these leaves will be thrown away anyway. So I took the leaf, put it in my sunglasses case to protect it and brought it home.

I had my concerns regarding the success of the propagation because the petiole was already missing and the cut was dry and a bit rotten, but since I had nothing to lose ...

So I came home, cut off the rotten part of the leaf, put it in soil and watered it. As you can see below, the poor leaf it's in soil up to its neck.

After 5 months she has babies :)

The babies are healthy, taller than the mother leaf and what's interesting: the mother leaf is still healthy.

Now I have to separate them soon to give them their own space. Still have to wait a couple of months for these babies to bloom which will be very hard.

If you go to YouTube you can find lots of video tutorials about multiplying, propagating African violets, I know. I just wanted to show you that even if you don't have the leaf's petiole, the leaf could be viable. Mine was, I did it.