Page 3 - Banana Development

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After about 5 or 6 hands of bananas are exposed and begin developing, we cut off the flower bulb. This allows the mother plant to devote all her energy into developing the remaining bananas to a ripe and sweet fruit.

To allow all the bananas to develop would most likely place a strain on the mother plant that would result in poorly developed fruit that would be small and perhaps not as sweet as one would desire.

Still, a lot of breakfasts to be had from the remaining 80 or so bananas that will grow on the hands that were left in place.
I took the flower bulb that we cut off and began removing the petals to expose the undeveloped banana hands that were contained inside the flower bud.

It is unbelievable how many potential hands of bananas that were in the bud.

I would believe that there could have been as many as 40 or 50 layers of bananas in this one flower bud.

They are so tiny and white in the development stage.

With each petal removed - another hand of bananas as you can see!
This is our "short" banana tree. This is full mature height. We followed the same procedure with this tree and removed the flower bud after 6 hands of bananas were developed.

These bananas were about 4 weeks old at the time of the photo.

This mother plant now has 3 "baby" plants growing from it. One is over half as tall as the mother plant already in 5 months.

Note:
Our banana trees seem to do very well in the hot dry season with only some watering (though they could use more).

They like lots of fertilizer, and it is good to add Potassium in the form of Potash to the ground around the plant.

We also cut off the dying leaves from the plant and cut them into pieces that we allow to fall to the ground around the plants. This acts as a mulch that keeps in the ground moisture that is so hard to come by in Southern Florida during the dry season from November to May.

I hope you have enjoyed our Banana web site and that it has been informative too.

Best Wishes to you from both of us wherever you live.

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