Draak

Hello Bananas! I've been reading many of the articles on here, and it's been great learning about how to start my banana collection!

Something that I've seen on a few posts is a general recommendation for growing type ABB bananas in California. I'm in the CA east bay, so this piqued my interest! I wasn't able to immediately discern why people had this suggestion, but I found a couple of articles describing that ABB bananas are the most drought resistant and perhaps require the least watering. Is this why people recommend them for CA? Would it be ridiculous to grow a Dwarf Namwah (ABB) next to a Mysore (AAB) and water them both the same?

Thank you!

pitangadiego

Never paid a lot of attention to AAB, ABB, AAAA, etc. Never seen any difference in water requirements between bananas. Biggest issue is temps. Hawaiian varieties, red varieties, Cavendish types are less cold tolerant. The Namwah will be more cold tolerant than the Mysore. Play. Experiment. ve fun.

__________________
Encanto Farms Nursery
http://encantofarms.com
We Be Bananas
http://webebananas.com

LukeSkyWRX

I have all my varieties together and they have roughly the same water and food needs once established. one large bed has Raja Puri, Brazilian, pisang Raja, Monthan, Pisang Ceylon, Namwah and sweetheart.

There are major differences in terms of hot and cold tolerance. Pisang Ceylon (Mysore) is slightly less tolerant of cold and extreme heat. it slows down more over 110f while Namwah goes strong till 120f or so before the leaves start burning.

Draak

This is amazing! Thank you guys for sharing your experience! Sticking to ABB bananas really slimmed down the choices. I'll have to look around at all the new things I can plant!

Do they take much more water than other large plants in your yard? I have drip irrigation lines running under thick mulch in my yard, and it would be great to know if I need to (for example) double the water they receive compared to my other large fruiting plants.

cincinnana

These guys get thirsty.
I use 1/4 variable drip on some of my plants up to 35 gal per hour and if your plants need more just run another line or two to the plant or operate your irrigation more frequently.

Some fellas use 1/2 inch spray/shrub risers and some use soaker hoses.
The plants do require a fair amount of water.

__________________

Draak

Well put! I suppose I'll give it a try with my current watering system, and if it's not enough, I'll just double the amount of drip emitters in that region.

Art_R

I have all of my bananas on a drip system. Each plant gets about 18 feet of emitter tube. Here is the emitter tubing I use: DIG Corporation Drip Line 100', 6" Spacing, 1/4" .52 GPH, color black (.170 ID x 240 OD) I run my system for one hour every other day during the summer months. All of my different varieties get the same amount of water. Although I wouldn't recommend this, I have seen bananas growing and producing fruit next to a pond with their roots submerged.

__________________
Here's what I'm growing: Grand Naine, Namwa, Blue Java, Raja Puri, Patupi, & a mystery nanner

cincinnana

well put.

__________________

Cenflo

The ABB genome has the most cold tolerance. Obviously there are cold tolerant outliers within the other genomes but in general the more Acuminata within the plant, the less cold tolerant. The ABB's are slightly more drought tolerant but they still need a lot of water.