Intro from Pensacola Florida
 

Been a lurker the last few days. Great site and a lot of banana knowledge here.

I live on the border of Florida and Alabama and am a newbie went it comes to banana growing. My first plant was put in the ground about 2 years ago by my sister-in-law. I do not know the variety but it has a small bunch that is about 4 months old now. I will try to post pictures in one of the sub-forums to try to understand what it may be. Recently I purchased 4 pups from a local hobbyist grower. Theses are Kandrian, Blue Java, Goldfinger and Orinoco. These were in containers and planted last weekend. Based on my research I mixed a lot of wood chip compost in with my sandy soil at a 50%/50% ratio and put some straight wood chip compost a foot under the plants. I also mixed in some 10/10/10 fertilizer and bone meal. I have now put a 6 inch layer of mulch over the plants to retain moisture. We just started out rainy season and have received about 8 inches of rain this week alone with more on the way. Don't think i will have root rot issues as the soil is well draining and i did plant in a mound.

Looking forward to getting to know you all and hopefully meeting some local growers here that I can pick there brains and maybe pick up another pup or 2 that will survive in North Florida. I plan to start a food forest on a quarter acre next year and would like to put in a Banana circle or 2.

Scott :woohoonaner:

Re: Intro from Pensacola Florida
 

welcome to the forum.

sandy soil, well draining. the first thing you want to do is go to lowe's and buy the cheap butt ph, light, moisture meter [before you buy any more bananas] and check the acidity in your soil. well draining sandy soil could mean you are high in acidity. i know, my acidity almost pegs the meter. almost 8, while most bananas like somewhere around a 5.5 ph.

some bananas dont mind so much a higher acidity, some will not grow at all. like cavendish and gran nain. your kandarin should do fairly well.

but i should add what is below the grass on my property, is not under the grass on yours.

welcome again. congrats on the flower and keep us posted.

the person who shows the most pics here is king.:ha:

Re: Intro from Pensacola Florida
 

Welcome!

Member Smeash in Ft. Walton successfully incorporated wood chips into his white sugar sand type soil. He had it delivered by the truckload. I think he got it for free becasue the tree service companies are looking for ways to dispose of the chips. He says the earthworms, rain, bugs, etc. break down the chips pretty fast. His patch looks looks great. I incorporated a couple pallets of Black Cow and continously mulch with bagged grass clippings.

Our area's superpower for growing banana plants is the rain. It rains like crazy and most of the rain falls during the growing season so doubly good. Fertilize your plants regularly and they will blow up.

Good luck!

Re: Intro from Pensacola Florida
 

Thanks Beam for the feedback. I have the exact meter that you had suggested. I just checked the soil/compost mix that the plants were put in and the ph read about 6.5. I will watch my bananas to see if they are impacted over the coming weeks. So far they seem to like where they were planted and nearly all put a new leaf on this week.

Re: Intro from Pensacola Florida
 

Thanks Akula. Its good to see someone from the home town area. The soil I have is not the white sugar sand but rather a sandy dark topsoil. Hopefully I did not kill my plants. Time will tell. I read you post on your fertilizing methods and will try to emulate it. Hopefully my soil will allow me to grow bananas as nice as yours are.

Scott

Re: Intro from Pensacola Florida
 

thanks, 6.5 should be very doable for nanners. just like all properties are not the same, neither are nanners. looking forward to seeing your adverntures.

Re: Intro from Pensacola Florida
 

Did you mean alkaline? 8 would be alkaline soil. 5 is acidic.

Re: Intro from Pensacola Florida
 

yep, my bad. thanks

Re: Intro from Pensacola Florida
 

if you add a bunch of ash to that you will have happier bananas, not that they arnt happy already. better to put in the ash in the ground than above it, i guarentee.

Re: Intro from Pensacola Florida
 

Welcome to the Jungle.....:woohoonaner:

Flora-bama...:nanadrink:

Re: Intro from Pensacola Florida
 

Welcome!