Outbreak of Violets Set for This Weekend

Carroll Gealy collects red African violets, blue African violets, pink African violets--but no yellow ones.

“I couldn’t get them to look pretty, so I quit trying,” said Gealy, who will be carting many of her 150-plus collection of the colorfully flowered plants to Thousand Oaks this weekend.

The 68-year-old Gealy, a member of the Thousand Oaks African Violet Society, will be at the club’s show and sale at the Thousand Oaks Library. At the two-day event, she’ll show off several breeds of her prized plants in competition. Maybe Ode to Beauty, Mississippi or Marching Band--she has many to choose from.

The Westlake Village resident will also sell about 50 of her plants at the show, though only duplicates, to make room for more breeds.

“I usually sell a lot of my plants at the show,” Gealy said. “Then I buy a lot more.”

She’s had some since the very beginning of her collecting days, others for only a decade or so. She grew one of her first plants from a $2 leaf-cutting in 1982. Today, it doesn’t look a day over one year, which is how long it takes to grow a mature plant from a cutting.

In 1988, Gealy bought Ode to Beauty through the mail. About 100 of her flowering plants, she said, were grown from cuttings she bought at other African violet conventions around the country.

Gealy proudly shows off her plants. Some are full-grown and have blossomed with the colorful flowers she strives to breed; others are immature and have yet to flower. Some are in her living room; most are in her grown son’s old bedroom. And she can look up all of them in a 2-inch-thick book of plant genealogies that traces the breeds to their origins.

In her son’s room, long since converted into a plant nursery, Gealy has three carts of the violets, each with three shelves and several 48-inch fluorescent lights, which she runs at night.

“I kind of just took over the room,” Gealy said. “My husband thinks it’s pretty funny.”

A string dangles from the bottom of each potted plant into a bottle of water to keep the soil moist. The collection of bottles includes used Grey Poupon, Frappuccino and vitamin containers, an assortment nearly as impressive as her African violet collection.

“At one point, I’ll cut back,” Gealy said. “It’s more work than I want to do.” But then again, she added, “I say that every year.”

The show will run from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Saturday, and 1 to 4 p.m. Sunday at 1401 Janss Road. For more information, call 495-0218.