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The center of my African Violets are leaved very tightly and not blooming. They look like healthy plants otherwise. I have tried to thin the packed leaves but it doesn’t help.
What do I do now?

First check for cyclamen mites a serious pest of African violets. These tiny arachnids like to hide in the growing center of the plant causing leaves to curl up and dry, grow tight center leaves, deform, twist and stunt the leaves-giving them a grayish or discolored appearance. They feed by sucking on plant sap and inject toxins that disrupt normal growth. If you take a magnifying glass and look in the crown or creases of the leaves you may see small eight legged creatures.  Cyclamen mites thrive in high humid (80-90%) and warm temperatures in the 60’s. 
To treat for cyclamen mite: Isolate the plant from all others to prevent infesting other plants. An old -fashioned treatment is to plunge the plant in a pot of 115 degree water bath for 15 minutes-which should kill the mites but not the plant. After treatment, place the plant in another area so that it doesn’t get re-infested.  Another method is to spray the plant with Neem (check label directions before spraying) or treat with a miticide labeled for indoor use such as Avid, Akari or Bonide Mite-X.  Once you get rid of the mites and removing the dried distorted leaves from the center,  it may take some time for the plant to return to a normal growing pattern.

The second possibility is that the African violet is getting either too much light or too much fertilizer causing the leaves to form a tight compact rosette in the center of the plant.

Two questions.. I grow african violets; some produce great blooms for me while others refuse to do so.. How can I make them flower? Also, I have one plant where the bottom leaves died off and the stem is now approximatly 5 inches tall with no leaves on the bottom only on top. The stem looks like it has “thorns” where the leaves dropped off from. What could cause this ??

First, let’s talk about blooming. Hard to say why one blooms and not the other. Violets tend to bloom when slightly pot bound. They need bright indirect light (East window) throughout the year and temperatures ranging from 60-80 degrees. In order to bloom, violets should receive no more than 16 hrs of light/day. Saintpaulias will grow with as little as 3 hrs of light per day. Conversely, they need at least 8 hrs of darkness to trigger blooming. The soiless mix that they are planted in have little nutrients and need to be supplemented, therefore feed it with a balanced liquid fertilizer (20-20-20) at 1/4 strength every time you water. Avoid fertilizer with urea which can cause root burn, pale leaves and reduce blooming. Another old suggestion is to sprinkle epson salts (magnesium sulfate) on top of the soil and water it in. Apply it once and it may take a month to see results.

When the lower leaves die back, they produce a “bare neck” look; to remedy this take the dull end of a knife and scape off the dead tissue along the stem, then repot so that the leaves line up with the edge of the pot and fill with soil.