lloydy
09-09-2012, 03:42 PM
Hello! I was very happy to find this site while looking for advice on how to grow bananas. Looks like there's a lot for me to get reading! Anyway I'll just ramble on a bit about me and my banana plant, so you might want to stop reading now if you get bored easily.
I have very little knowledge of gardening and how things grow. Me and my lass have hardy plants that can go for a while without much care because we're a bit useless. In any case, I've started taking a more active interest lately, especially with the notion that some varieties of banana plant can bear fruit in climates such as ours.
Anyway, I bought my banana plant from a giant gardening store in Malmö, Sweden where I currently live. At some point he (Bartholomew) grew a shoot so I removed that and planted it in a different pot, and was amazed to see more shoots come off both the original plant and the newly planted one. Since then there have been ups and downs. I'm currently using a kind of cactus soil (mixed with sand - drains easily) with a bedrock of small, marble-sized pebbles. The plants seem to like this, though to be fair I previously had them in regular potting soil when they had their first change as I was pretty clueless. Don't think this is ideal. In fact I'm planning to try getting hold of some really nutrient-rich soil produced here in Sweden from composting food waste. Of course I'll have to mix it with some other stuff.
In any case, I've just this eve removed more shoots from the original cactus, making a total of five separate plants. I left one really big shoot after having read the advice on this page:
How to Grow Bananas - A Guide to Banana Plants and How to Successfully Grow them. (http://www.whatprice.co.uk/gardening/bananas-growing.html)
and had to leave another few because some were too small and for the bigger one I didn't have any more pots. Right now they're sitting on an east-facing window sill in our apartment. Naturally, plants on that side get the best of the sun. I imagine that they would ideally have pretty strong sun all day long, so I'm looking into a home-made greenhouse solution on an allotment.
Okay I think that's my ramble! Thanks for hanging on, if you did. As I said, I'll get reading, but if anything comes to mind when reading this, please do chip in. It'd be much appreciated. Once again, nice to have found this community!
I have very little knowledge of gardening and how things grow. Me and my lass have hardy plants that can go for a while without much care because we're a bit useless. In any case, I've started taking a more active interest lately, especially with the notion that some varieties of banana plant can bear fruit in climates such as ours.
Anyway, I bought my banana plant from a giant gardening store in Malmö, Sweden where I currently live. At some point he (Bartholomew) grew a shoot so I removed that and planted it in a different pot, and was amazed to see more shoots come off both the original plant and the newly planted one. Since then there have been ups and downs. I'm currently using a kind of cactus soil (mixed with sand - drains easily) with a bedrock of small, marble-sized pebbles. The plants seem to like this, though to be fair I previously had them in regular potting soil when they had their first change as I was pretty clueless. Don't think this is ideal. In fact I'm planning to try getting hold of some really nutrient-rich soil produced here in Sweden from composting food waste. Of course I'll have to mix it with some other stuff.
In any case, I've just this eve removed more shoots from the original cactus, making a total of five separate plants. I left one really big shoot after having read the advice on this page:
How to Grow Bananas - A Guide to Banana Plants and How to Successfully Grow them. (http://www.whatprice.co.uk/gardening/bananas-growing.html)
and had to leave another few because some were too small and for the bigger one I didn't have any more pots. Right now they're sitting on an east-facing window sill in our apartment. Naturally, plants on that side get the best of the sun. I imagine that they would ideally have pretty strong sun all day long, so I'm looking into a home-made greenhouse solution on an allotment.
Okay I think that's my ramble! Thanks for hanging on, if you did. As I said, I'll get reading, but if anything comes to mind when reading this, please do chip in. It'd be much appreciated. Once again, nice to have found this community!