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View Full Version : My big p-stems overwintered in the garage, will they grow?


nph
04-05-2011, 10:19 PM
I had a Gran Nain, IceCream (8 fet high) and an unknown edible banana over winter in my garage in Dallas.
I made a mistake and left a plastic bag over the top so when I planted them outdoors three weeks back the top was rotten on them so I had to cut it off. Problem is that they have now all started putting out small pups but the mother plants have hardly grown at all. And the leaf second to the middle keeps going black and I have kept cutting them back. My big ice cream is now barely 4 feet. My Gran nain had a small leaf growing a few inches and then stopped.
The Gran Nain feels soft but if I peel a little it gets more firm in the p-stem. The Ice cream is really firm and only bad sign is what looks like one layer rotting towards the middle.

We have had some great days with 80s in the day and 60s at night and then some days with colder weather. What do you think, will the big plants rot away and I will be left with the pups eventually or is there still a chance?

I thought it would work since they looked great when I took them out of the garage. I had an Ice cream in a pot that was 5 feet and after cutting of a little stuff that looked rotten it has really taken taken off after I planted it in the ground a week after the other plants. Could it be that it takes a long time for the pure p-stem to form new roots etc?

Any advice from people who have done this before is most welcome. I hope you have some positive news for me. I would love to see some bananas from my ice cream. One of my plants actually flowered while in the garage but the middle of it was completely rotten so that was so far the closest to bananas that I have come.

ShearMe
04-06-2011, 07:18 AM
I don't know if it helps, but I'll share my Dallas situation too:

Overwintered my Ice Cream outside under a tarp (probably a bad idea). The main pstem and the biggest pup rotted so I cut them down a few inches every few days until I got to the bottom, turns out the center froze and died or something. The smaller pups which were present before winter are still alive and pushing out leaves, and I've seen a few new swords popping out of the ground.

I was hoping on keeping that massive beauty at the center, but I'm glad I didn't kill the whole grove!