First Time Grower

[kjpalm]

good evening. My name is Keith. I live in the New York. I have never grown bananas before. I look forward to growing bananas for the first time. I bought two Musa basjoo. One Dwarf Cavendish banana. I also bought one papaya. The Cavendish and the papaya are being grown in a pot it will be brought inside in the winter. I will be growing the Musa basjoo outside. The Cavendish in the papaya are in 19 inch pots with a mixture of Miracle Grow moisture control and coconut husk. my question is, do you think that this is decent enough for a potted plant. I also want to know when I plant the Musa Basjoo, should I use any special soil or will the regular ground soil work. the plants that I ordered are less than one foot tall. I read that they should be buried 6 inches underground. should I found this advice? I'm afraid of burying too deep and causing the stem to rot. lastly, how big can I expect the bananas to get by the end of the summer. Thank you.

[kjpalm]

One last question, nights are around 50. Is this too cold for them to be planted outside?

[cincinnana]

Originally Posted by kjpalm

good evening. My name is Keith. I live in the New York. I have never grown bananas before. I look forward to growing bananas for the first time. I bought two Musa basjoo. One Dwarf Cavendish banana. I also bought one papaya. The Cavendish and the papaya are being grown in a pot it will be brought inside in the winter. I will be growing the Musa basjoo outside. The Cavendish in the papaya are in 19 inch pots with a mixture of Miracle Grow moisture control and coconut husk. my question is, do you think that this is decent enough for a potted plant. I also want to know when I plant the Musa Basjoo, should I use any special soil or will the regular ground soil work. the plants that I ordered are less than one foot tall. I read that they should be buried 6 inches underground. should I found this advice? I'm afraid of burying too deep and causing the stem to rot. lastly, how big can I expect the bananas to get by the end of the summer. Thank you.

The soilless mix your using sounds good, use good watering practices with your potted plants.
Moisture control soilless mix's work just fine when used correctly.


Amend the soil( when you plant them in the ground) with organics, just use some of your soiless mix that you use in your containers.

Use good gardening practices when planting .

When planting your new small Basjooo plants in the ground set them at the same depth as in the container.......planting them deeper only applies to a mature and much larger corm and will not work for a small plant, and you WILL lose it.
In fact you could keep your Basjoo in a larger container and wait a year or two for it to get some size and then plant it in the ground. Preferred .

Expect growth of up to 5+- ft the first year with the new plants, except for the dwarf.

Go ahead and put your plants outdoors.


Miracle grow type fertilizer will work for you just fine with what you have.

[kjpalm]

Thank you for the reply. It looks like they are doing OK for their first week in the containers. The Musa Basjoo keeps leaning throughout the day and perking up at night. My guess is that its getting too much sun. I've tried to keep them just under the shade of a tree on the very edge and increasing the amount of time in the sun but have a very busy schedule so sometimes they get more than anticipated. How long before I can leave them in full sun? How often should I water them? Also two seem to be content because the dwarf Cavendish has an inner leaf the shot up two inches and has yet to unroll while one of the basjoos did unroll a new leaf.

Thanks again.