griphuz

I do volunteerwork in a kind of zoo here in the Netherlands, and we have a big greenhouse with tropical plants and animals there.
There are some bananas there, looking very much like basjoo, but how can I be sure?
I'll take some pictures soon.
They flower every now and then, but (although birds might pollinate it) no seeds in the small yellow banana's yet... I'll try to hand-pollinate them when I get the chance.
Would anyone (Mrbungalow?) be able to positively identify basjoo from a picture (flower, stem, leves, whatever you want) growing in the heated greenhouse year-round?

mrbungalow

Sure! Basjoo is easily identified if you can see the red midribs, general leaf-shape, and yellowish p-stems with a little black blotches here and there! You could almost positively ID i with a flower.

Sometimes when grown in warm/ low light conditions the red midrib on m. basjoo fades.

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Gabe15

There is Musa balbisiana there too, Ito-Basho (sometimes called Musa liukiuensis or M. babisiana var. liukiuensis) which is the true original Japanese fiber banana. But this plant is very easy to tell apart from M. basjoo.

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Growing bananas in Colorado, Washington, Hawaii since 2004. Commercial banana farmer, 200+ varieties.

tony palmer

Gabe,

just a thought, if the seeds were that of a hybrid, would the seeds also look like a cross between both bananas? Balbisiana seeds are nothing like Basjoo seeds.





Tony

Tropicallvr

Sunshine seeds in Germany was selling M.basjoo seeds briefly about 6-7 years ago, but I never ordered any.

Gabe15

If you are collecting F1 hybrid seeds, the seeds will look like the normal seeds of the female plant, but may be inviable. If the F1 plants are able to produce seeds (F2), then thier seeds would likely look different. Its hard to say what the seeds would like as every seedling from a cross is different and may show different traits in different expression levels from plant to plant.

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Growing bananas in Colorado, Washington, Hawaii since 2004. Commercial banana farmer, 200+ varieties.

taroking

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taroking

Musa basjoo

I'm sure most of you have read this description of Basjoo, but I thought I should post it again. I'm more interested in the Basjoo Formosana connection. I understood that Formosana is one of the parents of the legendary "hardiest banana on earth" But this may be an outdated description (those darn botanists anyway!) Does anyone have the official description of M. itinterans formosana? I cant find anything except on this site. We do get seed from out Basjoo up here in Canada, but they are sterile. I put this up to our climate not being appropriate for seed production
T.K.

Musa basjoo

stretch

Hey guys!...hope this helps; I noticed that Spring Hill Nurseries is offering in their spring '08 catalogue a "Hardy Banana" Musa Basjoo. Says you can grow where temps reach -20 deg. F. Grows 8-10' and produces pale yellow, springtime flowers followed by decorative (inedible) yellowish-green fruit in summer. Also they are offering a dwarf Banana (Musa Dwarf Cavendish). I think this one is a nice looking plant!

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stretch

griphuz

right, -20 F, that's like -30 Celcius,.....don't think even basjoo will survive that long, let alone any other banana...

sandy0225

I don't think it would survive that temp for very long, but it all depends on the mulching. Mine has survived -18 last winter, but heavily mulched. I wish I had some records on the winter before last though, because I remember it as being colder even than that one night. They do show the lowest recorded here at -28 F !

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Sandy Burrell



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