I just found this site and have lots of questions, so I'll be doing a lot of reading!

My first question is, what kind do I have or where can I go to figure that out?(I'll post pictures after work) I live in Austin TX and have for 2 years. The plants where here when we bought the house and have gotten much bigger since. We have 2 plants, both of which have about 10-12 stalks(trees?) each.

I was told the variety we have was ornamental and last night while cutting some leaves back off of the house, I cut a large bloom looking thing. Upon opening it up, I found MANY small bananas! It sounds like from what I've read already here, that one will die. I wish I wouldn't have hit it with my machete. I would have like to have seen them fully grow and ripen. This particular stalk(tree?) was about 14"d and 15' tall.

Thanks

Pictures:

http://members.cox.net/pbgorman/DSCF0092.JPG

http://members.cox.net/pbgorman/DSCF0094.JPG

http://members.cox.net/pbgorman/DSCF0095.JPG

http://members.cox.net/pbgorman/DSCF0097.JPG

http://members.cox.net/pbgorman/DSCF0099.JPG

http://members.cox.net/pbgorman/DSCF0100.JPG

Hello, I am new here too. I have been reading lots on bananas. I had one 7 foot tree last year that was given to me, then I got the bug. I have 4 other breeds I am working with indoors right now, hopefully to transplant them outdoors this spring.
As far as your banana type, they look like Dwarf Banana link here>> http://www.banana-tree.com/Product_Detail~category~13~Product_ID~575.cfm Some of the banana plants look similiar, so is hard to say (also looks like a Iholene Red banana). Also said they are edible-careful. Maybe search the pics on this site.
I hopefully will have one of them (Dwarf Banana) next hear if I can get these seeds going. I wanted to taste them also. Hope this helps.
Chris

Edited by Moleh8r on Dec 23, 2004 at 02:17 PM

hi,
i think the banana you have is not an ornamental, especially when i saw the pic of the flower, and also the hight of your bananas. it seems you have the William variety, but i am not sure.

another thing about the place you are planting the banana, the leaves are in bad condition and all the leaves are dried and dead. bananas can be grown in Austin, but they require a lot of irrigating water & humidity. hard freeze & hail, and strong wind will kill them. if the growing season ( time where the temp reaches to 80 Df, was more than 6 month) then you might have time for the bananas to flower before the frost arrives. to fasten the growth of the banana, at the begining of the spring, remove all the suckers, except the bigest and the strogest one, this will make it grows faster (no compitition on light, water and nutrients), and as a result flowers early. the banana plant needs (after flowering) from 90 to 120 days of heat (temp about 80 df and humidity) so that the bunch can be harvested mature green.

please if you have any question, do not hesitate to ask.

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bob

Thanks Bob! Remember, these photos were taken in December and we had already had a hard frost. We usually get one a year in November-December. We rarely get snow or temps below 32 degrees.

I usually cut them back about this time each year to remove the dead tops. We can consistantly get 100 degree days during the summer and 85-95 is probably the average through the summer. Humidity is not usually a problem either and they are irrigated with timers for watering. I usually cut them back to the ground, but this year I think I'll try leaving 3-4' of plant and let them have a head start on growth.

I understand that frost comes in December and kills the plant. I assume the bananas you have flowered in November or December. And you have a frost every year coming at this time of the year, thus killing the flower before turning into a bunch.

The only way to escape from the frost is by having the banana plant flower in June or early July. For example you have to select a sucker at the beginning of the spring, I think most probably in March. This sucker should be at least 1 m tall, try to make it one sucker every mat (every mother, have many suckers, that compete with each other on nutrients and light, and water) so try to decrease the number of suckers to one in March, so that the sucker will start to grow fast, and hopefully will flower in June or July, as a result it will have enough time like (120 days) to turn mature green, ready to be harvested before November December, the frost time. (Proper fertilization should be done to achieve this).
I hope this might help.
Bye the way how did u post these pics?

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bob

Thanks for the suggestions Bob....

As far as the pictures, I hosted them on my web space and then just copy clipped the link and pasted it into the message body....

thank you pagorman

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bob