Blue Ballerina

[Nievesgirl]

[Cindy]

I know what you mean about Blue Ballerina, Kerry.  It always strikes me the same way! It's such a formal little thing, with such perfect form, dark red eye, pure white ring, perfectly formed blue petals. It's a true miniature. :-)

I'm glad you like it so much too! 
Cindy

[Nievesgirl]

Charlie how would your rate this CV as far as growth ? I only ask because I am trying to figure out if mine is growing slow due to it being in self watering pot. Depending on your answer I will either keep it in the pot or put it in a regular pot.  It has been growing super super slow for me but its budding now. It wont grow branches either just small shoots then blooms

[Darkhorse]

Kerry,

   My BB is a medium to slow grower.  Could it be that your plant is putting most of its energy into budding, rather than growing branches? 

   I remember a discussion about picking off buds as they appear to encourage more vegetative growth.  Maybe you should try that?

Jordan

[Charlie]

What I've observed is that Blue Ballerina responds to heat or cold more than some others. In hot conditions it grows with above average vigor and particularly branches well. In milder conditions it slows way down. If this holds for your plant you should see a lot more growth in the July to October period this year.

Jordan's idea about pinching buds to encourage growth is not something I normally do (unless a plant seems stuck for some reason and is not growing at all but is making buds) but I know another commercial grower who did this routinely and thought it helped.

Charlie

[Nievesgirl]

Thanks Charlie I will bring BB to my aunts house in front of a sunny window and let it get bigger.

[nina]

By some sort of a mistake, I pruned my Blue Ballerina too much this spring, taking off all the branches but the trunk. To my surpise, it has branched into 5 new branches, and from April to now they are all about 40 cm long. This is an excellent growth this season (two year old plant). Last year, it seemed to be a slow grower.

Now, I am very curious to see what the bush will look like next season, when I prune all those 5 branches.

[helixturnhelix]

I agree Nina that BB is an interesting grower to say the least.  It starts off pretty slow, then explodes into growth blooming like crazy.  I bet next year you will have a very full bush

[Charlie]

The 6 inch pots behave similarly - slow start and then suddenly they shoot up and branch out and get almost too big to ship in 6 inch pots!

Charlie

[Nievesgirl]

Charlie will you be having any more this season ? I want to replace mine that died

[Charlie]

Yes, there are some Blue Ballerina that were just potted up to 4 inch size. They need time to root through the pot and develop more healthy top growth but perhaps by the end of October a few small ones can ship. Most of them will ship in spring as much bigger 4 inch plants with several branches already started.

Charlie

[Nievesgirl]

Yes, there are some Blue Ballerina that were just potted up to 4 inch size. They need time to root through the pot and develop more healthy top growth but perhaps by the end of October a few small ones can ship. Most of them will ship in spring as much bigger 4 inch plants with several branches already started.

Charlie

I think I need one to grow out more so If I do happen to get one I will see if you guys can ship it in spring.  Out of all the CV's I have only 2 of them are doing poorly with my lights.

[laural]

 My beautiful Blue Ballerina

[Charlie]

Laural, its good to see you are adding photos to the cultivar pages instead of all going into photos of the day pages. I've been planning to move some photos from the older Photos of the Day pages into the cultivar pages but its a slow job and I've not given it high priority. Thanks for adding them.

Charlie

[Darkhorse]

I've often been wondering how we should deal with that.  Maybe when we post photos, we should post them in both the blooms of the day and the cv's thread.