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Originally Posted by chipboy44
So I was wanting to know was wether you managed to get some seeds of that banana that you were holding that enormous stalk? I noticed they were full of seeds. Also did that pink banana produce seeds or was it an eating banana or was it also a seede variety?
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I don't have seeds or plants from the trip to send out. I get asked all of the time for the many varieties I have and come across, but it is quite difficult to collect and distribute the plants safely (to avoid disease issues) and legally in some cases. I hope one day to be able to make some more varieties available, and I have in the past introduced a few varieties to nurseries which are now available in the market, but it takes a lot of time which is something I don't have a lot of these days. I recommended those wild ones be collected for the germplasm bank, so maybe one day they will be available.
The pink-fruited banana, 'Ruhuvia Chichi', is an edible banana and did not have seeds.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Yug
Great pics!
The edible varieties make me curious as to how they were developed. Could they just be variations of very old edible cultivars that have been grown for centuries, that have shown some deviation of the original, and are now considered a different cultivar? I'm guessing, I don't really know how different bananas are made/bred.
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Yes, that is more or less how all edible bananas have become unique cultivars, as mutants from other types. This is why there are so many varieties which are very similar, but differ in some small ways such as height, pigmentation, fruit size etc...
The process which made those first edible bananas is much more complex and can be found elsewhere on this site, perhaps later I can try to find some old posts I've written about it to link to here.