Quote:
Originally Posted by Woods
Well, last night zapped the bananas. Our normal low is 40 and it was 24 last night and lower tonight. What do you use to cut them? I plan on cutting them off and mulching well. Do you need a clean cut and how low should I cut them off? I am new to bananas, as you may have discerned.
Thank you very much
Shivering in Tallahassee,
Woods
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Before you cut, feel the trunk. Where ever it feels soft/ mushy, that part is no longer good. You'll have to cut it back to where it still feels very hard/ firm. If they didn't mush all the way down then you can likely cut them just below where the frozen part was, protect the rest of the pseudostem / base that is above the ground with wrap and xmas lights, or some other form of heat to keep them from freezing, and it should regrow from that point. That said, it also is gonna depend on the type of banana too I think.
If your GROUND froze solid more than 1/2 to 1" deep, well that may have damaged the corm too, unless its one of the very cold hardy types.
Depending on how large / fat the pseudostems are you can use some very sharp loppers/ shears, or something similar to a machete. Make sure whatever you use is sharp, and if its a machete, that you whack it good, and very hard so the cut goes clean through without tearing. For the LARGE basjoos here they usually use machetes in so far as I have seen, but here, they usually take them down to just about ground level so the stems that are being cut are too FAT for loppers, and will freeze anyway. This has been my experience and what I have seen. Im sure others may have much more to add, or maybe better ways to go about it.
Good luck! Let us know how they do / if they come back for you.