Letting Bananas Grow into Stand
I have been conflicted about information I have heard about maintaining banana mats. I have read you should be removing pups and not letting them compete with the mother plant.
I planted a Nam Wah in May that was about 5’ tall. It has since turned into one 9’ mother plant, 7’ pup, 5’ pup, and two other small swords. I hate digging into the root ball of my lovely thriving plant. I read that removing pups will increase yields and speed up fruiting. Then I see large mats allowed to grow into little groves that seem to have a perpetual yield of fruit. I like the idea of letting the mat become large and vigorous. Seems like the more stems (to the extent I can physically house them) gives the corm more energy to withstand adverse conditions. I keep them well fed and watered. I have deep mulch around them and also have a large mouldering compost pile (36” diameter pipe stood on end with lid that I fill with kitchen waste and compostables) immediately adjacent to the corm.
Just wanted to see what people on this forum thought. I think I will most likely leave them to grow into a small stand with at least 2-3 mature stems.
Thanks !
Last edited by Graycat : 08-27-2020 at 09:14 PM.
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