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bananafarmer
04-30-2012, 04:13 PM
Hello,

I am new , to this forum, reading posts for some weeks.

I am a Bananafarmer in Turkey, I own a greenhouse, it has the size of three hectare.

I really like this forum, there are many topics that are really interessant for me, I am facing many different problems every day,many are written in the forum.

For some problems I have different solutions, hope I will post some in the near future.

I will introduce my greenhouse in the near future, with pictures, showing the whole system, air circulation, watering,e.t.c.

I earn money with this job, but I really love growing bananas, best job I have ever done.

There is some kind of ambition within this job, trying to make it better every day, you look at the bananas and you see your progress, that is the point that motivates me.

Sincerely yours

oakshadows
04-30-2012, 04:59 PM
Yes this is a very good site to get information about bananas but also many other plants.
Welcome from central Florida, USA.

Richard
04-30-2012, 05:23 PM
There is some kind of ambition within this job, trying to make it better every day, you look at the bananas and you see your progress, that is the point that motivates me.

Absolutely! :08:

harveyc
05-01-2012, 01:34 AM
I definitely look forward to seeing your photos. Welcome!

Dalmatiansoap
05-01-2012, 05:26 AM
Welcome from Croatia!
Thats a nice project U run there, what varieties U grow?
:nanadrink:

bananafarmer
05-01-2012, 12:57 PM
"what varieties U grow"

I only cultivate one sort of bananas, it is very similiar to Grand Nain, maybe one kind of G.N.?

I have some fotos in my gallery, you can see the weight of the bunch, at the picture look at the scale-display (red-led).

http://www.bananas.org/gallery/watermark.php?file=48672&size=1 (http://www.bananas.org/gallery/showphoto.php?photo=48672)

http://www.bananas.org/gallery/watermark.php?file=48671&size=1 (http://www.bananas.org/gallery/showphoto.php?photo=48671)

Dalmatiansoap
05-01-2012, 02:14 PM
Bravo! If thats regular bunch, you are doing a great job there.
:nanadrink:

harveyc
05-01-2012, 04:07 PM
wow, looks great! Do you have any disease or insect pests with your greenhouse operation?

GreenFin
05-01-2012, 11:31 PM
Awesome! I also use a greenhouse to grow my bananas, but it's pretty small, so I'm eager to see your giant greenhouse pics :)

A hectare is around 2.5 acres, so you've got around 7.5 acres under glass/plastic. Pretty cool!

I offer one bold prediction: you will start growing more types of bananas as a result of this website! I had only intended to grow one banana plant when I started a few months ago...and now I'm growing 12 different kinds lol.

Welcome to the forum :bananas_b

bananafarmer
05-02-2012, 12:53 AM
wow, looks great! Do you have any disease or insect pests with your greenhouse operation?


Yes sadly, like almost anyone here I have spider-mites and aphids in my greenhouse.

In the winter the bananas suffer a little bit from cold, and in the summer the leafs can burn, shadowing is important when the sun becomes stronger.


I think what the mites do not like is shadow and moisture, I try to keep the greenhouse moist and shaowed all the time.

Furthermore I make pest control about three times a year. Black Sigatoga or other diseases never appear here, I do not have any other problems than aphids and spider mites.

One more , I had rats in the greenhouse, they damaged the fruits sometimes, so I gave them poison to reduce them. I created feeding stations in every corner of the greenhouse.

Gave them different poison-food, also put food into pipes to give them the feeling of safety.

I was also very kindly to cats that come to the greenhouse, gave them some snacks.

I could not recognize any other diseases until now, maybe I did not realize.Maybe some disease do not occur here, we have subtropical climate here.

harveyc
05-02-2012, 01:32 AM
I'm curious about your growing of bananas in a subtropical climate. How cold does it get at your farm? Do you heat your greenhouse? What allows you to compete against large growers from the tropics?

I have a very small greenhouse where I shelter some of my bananas and other exotic hobby plants but don't think I could justify a commercial venture of banana growing due to the costs of production being so high with a greenhouse structure. This past winter was a cold one for my area with 35 nights of frost and dropping down to 22F once. Hopefully, you are working with a more favorable climate.

Thanks for answering my curious mind. :)

bananafarmer
05-02-2012, 01:59 AM
I'm curious about your growing of bananas in a subtropical climate. How cold does it get at your farm? Do you heat your greenhouse? What allows you to compete against large growers from the tropics?

I have a very small greenhouse where I shelter some of my bananas and other exotic hobby plants but don't think I could justify a commercial venture of banana growing due to the costs of production being so high with a greenhouse structure. This past winter was a cold one for my area with 35 nights of frost and dropping down to 22F once. Hopefully, you are working with a more favorable climate.

Thanks for answering my curious mind. :)

Hi,

our climate is singular in Turkey, our town is at the Med-Sea, the North is protected from the Taurus Mountains, at winter we have almost never frost.I never heat the greenhouse.

The reason why we can compete with the TNC´s is that the domestic market in case of banana fruits is protected. Foreign banana fruits have to be declared.

This protects us from Dole, Chiquita etc., it creates jobs here, is good for our industry, also ecolocially it´s better, remember the fruits are shipped many thousand miles.

The WTO is not so excited about this policy, in my opinion the WTO represents some strong states and is supporting their Companys.

bananafarmer
05-02-2012, 02:09 AM
I'm curious about your growing of bananas in a banana growing due to the costs of production being so high with a greenhouse structure.



Our structures are very simple, will post pictures, we have a banana-industry here , there are many teams that create greenhouse structures, so its not extremely expensive.

One hectare greenhouse costs about 9000 Euro(the material). With one hectare in superb condition you can earn about 4000 Euro in one year.

Working costs for one hectare is about 800 Euro(the amount you have to pay for the construction team) .

bananafarmer
05-02-2012, 10:35 AM
Awesome! I also use a greenhouse to grow my bananas, but it's pretty small, so I'm eager to see your giant greenhouse pics :)



Here are some pics , from today.

http://www.bananas.org/gallery/watermark.php?file=48687&size=1 (http://www.bananas.org/gallery/showphoto.php?photo=48687&ppuser=12430)

http://www.bananas.org/gallery/watermark.php?file=48684&size=1 (http://www.bananas.org/gallery/showphoto.php?photo=48684&ppuser=12430)

http://www.bananas.org/gallery/watermark.php?file=48686&size=1 (http://www.bananas.org/gallery/showphoto.php?photo=48686&ppuser=12430)

harveyc
05-02-2012, 10:45 AM
Do you use any fans for cooling?

Might the bananas you grow possibly be Gros Michel? Before you wrote that you thought that they might be Gran Nain, I thought they appeared like some of the photos of Gros Michel we've had posted here. :)

GreenFin
05-02-2012, 10:54 AM
Here are some pics , from today.

http://www.bananas.org/gallery/watermark.php?file=48687&size=1 (http://www.bananas.org/gallery/showphoto.php?photo=48687&ppuser=12430)

http://www.bananas.org/gallery/watermark.php?file=48684&size=1 (http://www.bananas.org/gallery/showphoto.php?photo=48684&ppuser=12430)

http://www.bananas.org/gallery/watermark.php?file=48686&size=1 (http://www.bananas.org/gallery/showphoto.php?photo=48686&ppuser=12430)

Thanks for the pics :)

bananafarmer
05-02-2012, 11:00 AM
Do you use any fans for cooling?

Might the bananas you grow possibly be Gros Michel? Before you wrote that you thought that they might be Gran Nain, I thought they appeared like some of the photos of Gros Michel we've had posted here. :)


No , I do not use fans, I have many windows for air-circulation, one is in the middle on top of the greenhouse, goes from north to south, the whole length, also I have windows, at the nort side , at the south side , furthermore on the west and east side.

I also use chalk to shadowing the greenhouse, when summer begins, the whole outer surface.

I have a real good temperature inside, at the moment max. 30 degrees, at 12 o´clock at noon. Inside I feel the air circulating.

I do not know If they are Gros Michel, the results are very good, the sort is very strong and resistent against diseases, also the bunches are heavy and of good quality.

I got the bananas six years ago, from a farmer who where cultivating them for many years outside, that made natural selection, just the best ones where choosen to be cultivated again.

I really dont know exactly which sort my bananas are, maybe a mix of something?

GreenFin
05-02-2012, 11:34 AM
How tall are the p-stems when the plants fruit? (not the height to the top of the leaves, just the top of the p-stem)

Gros Michel is a substantially taller plant than Grand Nain (I think Grand Nain fruits at around 8' of p-stem and Gros Michel fruits at around 12' of p-stem). If your plants are fruiting at 12', then they're probably not Grand Nain. If they're fruiting in the 6-9' range, they may be Grand Nain or they may be a dwarf form of Gros Michel. [OK, somebody start shining the banana signal up into the clouds so Gabe knows we need his help here.]

Regardless of whether your naners are Grand Nain or Gros Michel, they sure look great!

bananafarmer
05-02-2012, 12:09 PM
How tall are the p-stems when the plants fruit? (not the height to the top of the leaves, just the top of the p-stem)

Gros Michel is a substantially taller plant than Grand Nain (I think Grand Nain fruits at around 8' of p-stem and Gros Michel fruits at around 12' of p-stem). If your plants are fruiting at 12', then they're probably not Grand Nain. If they're fruiting in the 6-9' range, they may be Grand Nain or they may be a dwarf form of Gros Michel. [OK, somebody start shining the banana signal up into the clouds so Gabe knows we need his help here.]

Regardless of whether your naners are Grand Nain or Gros Michel, they sure look great!
Tomorrow I will try to check this in the greenhouse. One more photo from today.

http://www.bananas.org/gallery/watermark.php?file=48691 (http://www.bananas.org/gallery/showphoto.php?photo=48691)

bananafarmer
05-02-2012, 01:10 PM
Thanks for the pics :)

If you want to see my little setup, here's a link: GreenFin Gardens (http://www.greenfingardens.com)

I'm doing/developing something that I call "high tunnel aquaponics." One of the positive aspects of it is that, due to the huge amount of water involved, my growing environment is very humid/wet, so spider mites aren't a problem. The water also regulates the temperature: even though I'm in zone 6a and have extremely long, cold winters (temps often way below freezing), the environment stays warm year-round even without supplemental heating. And from a laziness perspective, I never have to water any of my plants, since they're constantly automatically watered :)

EDIT: I do have to water the few potted plants I have in there...which is one reason I don't think I'm going to try growing any more potted plants lol

Sometime soon I'll take the time to write up a thread about it in case other folks are interested in trying to set up something similar.


Your project looks really cool to me, like the fishes very much, look what picture I took today inside the greenhouse.

http://www.bananas.org/gallery/watermark.php?file=48692&size=1 (http://www.bananas.org/gallery/showphoto.php?photo=48692&ppuser=12430)

harveyc
05-02-2012, 01:10 PM
If you can post a photo or two of different stages of prior flowers it would be helpful for Gabe to take a look to see what variety he thinks it is. Gabe is our identification expert here.

Edible bananas don't cross-breed on their own so yours should be some existing variety, not a mix of varieties. Even so, there are hundreds of varieties to chose from so identification can be challenging much of the time.

bananafarmer
05-02-2012, 01:23 PM
If you can post a photo or two of different stages of prior flowers it would be helpful for Gabe to take a look to see what variety he thinks it is. Gabe is our identification expert here.

Edible bananas don't cross-breed on their own so yours should be some existing variety, not a mix of varieties. Even so, there are hundreds of varieties to chose from so identification can be challenging much of the time.

Thanks for helping me to identificate, here are two photos.

http://www.bananas.org/gallery/watermark.php?file=48694&size=1 (http://www.bananas.org/gallery/showphoto.php?photo=48694)

http://www.bananas.org/gallery/watermark.php?file=48693&size=1 (http://www.bananas.org/gallery/showphoto.php?photo=48693)

The photos are from the same flower, at the same time, I will try to find a photo from another stage of development, maybe newborn, but I hope I can post more pictures, maybe my limit is reached?

GreenFin
05-02-2012, 01:59 PM
Disclaimer: I'm not an expert by a long shot

Those plants look like Grand Nain to me, but I think the bunches in your picture look more like Gros Michel than Grand Nain. Anyone think they might be Williams Hybrid (or perhaps tall Williams)? Here's a pic of Jarred's Williams Hybrid bunch, and the fruits are really plump like bananafarmer's:

<a href=http://www.bananas.org/gallery/showphoto.php?photo=8196&si=williams><img src=http://www.bananas.org/gallery/watermark.php?file=8196&size=1 border=0></a>


Here's a video labeled "Grand Naine banana farm" for further comparison:

Grand naine banana farm - YouTube (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cWocr9YzJbQ)

bananafarmer
05-02-2012, 02:25 PM
Disclaimer: I'm not an expert by a long shot

Those plants look like Grand Nain to me, but I think the bunches in your picture look more like Gros Michel than Grand Nain. Anyone think they might be Williams Hybrid (or perhaps tall Williams)? Here's a pic of Jarred's Williams Hybrid bunch, and the fruits are really plump like bananafarmer's:

<a href=http://www.bananas.org/gallery/showphoto.php?photo=8196&si=williams><img src=http://www.bananas.org/gallery/watermark.php?file=8196&size=1 border=0></a>


Here's a video labeled "Grand Naine banana farm" for further comparison:

Grand naine banana farm - YouTube (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cWocr9YzJbQ)


I watched the video, the bunches and fruits really look like mine, but the trees are much smaller, my trees I suppose are almost double in height, I mean double in height in the same stage as in the video, when the flowers are all out.

GreenFin
05-02-2012, 02:39 PM
I watched the video, the bunches and fruits really look like mine, but the trees are much smaller, my trees I suppose are almost double in height, I mean double in height in the same stage as in the video, when the flowers are all out.

The plot thickens... :lurk:

Here are some possibilities:

Lacatan (my official guess)
Robusta/Valery
tall Williams
Gros Michel
?

sunfish
05-02-2012, 03:19 PM
Antalya's Banana Groves (http://ip-173-201-150-68.ip.secureserver.net/articles/antalyas_banana_groves/)

http://www.pakbs.org/pjbot/PDFs/36%282%29/PJB36%282%29331.pdf

Turkey: Future of Alanya bananas looks bright (http://www.freshplaza.com/news_detail.asp?id=54919)

GreenFin
05-02-2012, 04:00 PM
I've been searching for info on the Turkish banana industry to see if there's a standard type that's commonly grown (which might help with identifying bananafarmer's plants).

The first bit I found was a paper that compared outdoor Dwarf Cavendish to greenhouse Dwarf Cavendish.

The second bit I found was a summary of the industry (http://www.guide2gazipasa.com/fruits.html) that says, "The type of banana produced in Turkey is called Musa Cavendish or Dwarf Cavendish."

Third bit is an abstract from another paper (http://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/tandf/sagb/2004/00000054/00000004/art00007): "The objective of this study was to evaluate the production potential of banana cultivars, 'Grand Nain', 'Petit Nain', 'Poyo', 'Williams' and 'Basrai', as alternatives to the 'Dwarf Cavendish' for open-field and greenhouse cultivation in subtropical conditions. Stem circumference, stem height, total leaf number, bunch stalk circumference, days from shooting to harvest, number of hands per bunch, number of fingers per bunch, finger circumference, finger length and bunch weight were measured in open-field and greenhouse cultivation. Cultivars 'Williams' and 'Grand Nain' were superior to 'Dwarf Cavendish' in greenhouse cultivation, while these two cultivars and 'Petit Nain' and 'Basrai' were superior to 'Dwarf Cavendish' in open-field cultivation. 'Poyo' was not suitable for greenhouse cultivation because of its excessive height and for open-field cultivation due to its sensitivity to wind damage. Greenhouse cultivation of bananas was superior to open-field cultivation for all cultivars with increases in yield of 19 to 28% according to the cultivar."

4th bit is another abstract from another paper (https://docs.google.com/viewer?a=v&q=cache:0jBdvKNFdJ4J:journals.usamvcj.ro/horticulture/article/viewFile/854/855+&hl=en&gl=us&pid=bl&srcid=ADGEESi0vwun0stPzIOSgR2MwirbTGpqTAruoqdVXJ06miBUqOhrG82EuB wR-NRZ40Bv2iABhgmS0sqTo_4snVIOh2I9oBlEwQd1u3TRORAy1vMRyuXFKgnCRpVkN d-yHWCCkgyh21Ep&sig=AHIEtbThwS2r0Pa1uSDT-XBqGUOrUPdX1w): "Dwarf Cavendish, a commonly grown banana cultivar in Turkey. However, ‘Grand Nain’ is very popular cultivar under protected cultivation due to the higher yield and quality presently. The objective of this study was to compare to the banana cultivars, ‘Grand Nain’ and ‘Dwarf Cavendish’ under protected cultivation in the subtropical condition. Stem circumference, stem height, total leaf number, bunch stalk circumference, days from shooting to harvest, number of hands per bunch, number of fingers per bunch, finger circumference, finger length and bunch weight were measured in the protected cultivation. Cultivars ‘Grand Nain’ was found to be better than ‘Dwarf Cavendish’ in terms of total production, expressed as the number of hands and fingers per bunch and bunch weight under protected cultivation."

bananafarmer
05-02-2012, 04:11 PM
I've been searching for info on the Turkish banana industry to see if there's a standard type that's commonly grown (which might help with identifying bananafarmer's plants).

s ‘Grand Nain’ was found to be better than ‘Dwarf Cavendish’ in terms of total production, expressed as the number of hands and fingers per bunch and bunch weight under protected cultivation."

Dwarf Cavendish is not planted so often anymore, taller bananas are planted regularly now,Dwarf Cavendish, classic type will vanish more and more, that is my opinion.

In the past it was grown in greenhouses that were not very high, approx. about 5 m high,

the newer greenhouses are 9-10 m high in the middle at the side they are about 6 m high, it is logical that higher plants with bigger bunches will be planted inside these greenhouses.

The classical Dwarf Cavendish , I do not see it very often anymore.

Also taller bananas which came to Anamur from Alanya are also planted outside are spreading. The are called Alanya Azmani, suppose they are some kind of Grand Nain, the are very tall, and they have heavy bunches with long bananas.

bananafarmer
05-02-2012, 04:18 PM
I've been searching for info on the Turkish banana industry to see if there's a standard type that's commonly grown (which might help with identifying bananafarmer's plants).

"

That what you call industry , I would not call it like that, we do not have big companys who grow bananas here, very often the producers are families, or persons.

Many persons here own land, also the poorest man here is owning a house and a little land.

So there ist no phasing in banana-production, every family is growing what they believe is the best, or many times its just coincidence.

I suppose there are dozens of varietys that are grown here.

GreenFin
05-02-2012, 06:52 PM
the newer greenhouses are 9-10 m high in the middle at the side they are about 6 m high

Wow, a person could almost grow Sabas in there!