Limnobium

I have recently (3weeks ago) obtained a Dwarf Musa which I believe is a Triploid specimen as it was purchased from a respectable greenhouse and labeled "Cavendish"

It has sprouted many many pups which is characteristically much like the Musa Acuminata which as we know is a dwarf specimen.

I'm assuming the "Cavendish" label was referring to the seedless properties of the plant which is likely a hybridized banana plant created for the purpose of Triploidism and cultivated by parthenogenesis and Corm transplants.

I had thought the plant would need humidity so I attempted to plumb an ultrasonic humidifier but the fog would land on the plant in an area that wasn't distributed enough and it would cause a risk of rot and mildew.

I've since gathered some parts and I'm going to create a manifold above the plant which will pipe humidity and distribute it evenly above the plant where it will descend down out of 4 ports, the humidifier also will be in the area and it has a hygromastat which will limit the humidity to about 55% which is optimal for banana.

I use a 50 watt LED multi diode multiband LED (CHIP) with ultraviolet and infrared, far red, close red, far blue, close blue, green, tangerine, and teal spectrums. Made by SunGrow®
Very effective mimicry of sunlight.

I noticed what I thought was mildew growing on the leaves I now realize it is naturally occurring on young leaves, specifically the bottom of newly unfurled leaves, it's a fine dust, visible in my photo, scared me!!

I'm currently debating whether I will buy or build a tent for it, I am leaning towards building a cheap poly one because I don't know how big the dwarf will actually get, indoors I'm assuming not much more than 5-6 ft and I will start inducing flowering

The plant itself will go into a DWC bucket tomorrow, I will remove several of the suckers tomorrow and allow the 2 main shoots to continue growing, they are about 24" tall from the base of the pseudostems.

I believe once I have completed the fogger installation and transplanted everything the growth will be extremely rapid as all the parameters will be maximally optimized.

I am going to feed liquid seaweed 5-1-1 formula but only enough to supply micros, the bulk of the nitrates, phosphates, and potassium will come from KNO3, & MKP.
I think I will supplement extra magnesium with MgSO4 and possibly Fe Iron Chelate.

Is there anything else I should be incorporating as far as nutrients when I am growing Musa hydroponically!??

All advice greatly appreciated.

Sincerely
-Limnobium

pjkfarm

Question: Unless you are using distilled water, are you not concerned that the humidifier will deposit whatever minerals are in the water on the leaves? We use either a steam humidifier (pain to constantly clean element), or an evaporative one - using a cloth sheet pad which generally we throw away, but sometimes wash (we use rags, old sheets, towels, etc). Paper pads are most effective but cost. And in our main house, which has dirt floor and plants growing in it, humidity is high as we keep everything watered and between transpiration and evaporation keeps more humid than we like.
And Wow! hydroponic - very curious to see how that turns out - has anyone else tried it?
If there are roots on suckers, before you throw them away, would you like to donate them??

Limnobium

Limnobium

Limnobium

Whereabouts are you located?

I have a dozen suckers of various size, I'm in Alberta Canada.

Limnobium

Some photos of the Maiden Suckers newly birthed leaf and a top shot of the large plants canopy, a new cigar leaf ready to start unfurling any day.

I hope it decides to go in a nice photogenically aesthetically pleasing direction.
We will see.

I added natural urea (human urine) day before yesterday and also added some filterfloss from my fishtank to supplement beneficial nitrifying bacteria, the ammonia in the urine will act as feedstock for bacteria which will convert it into nitrates and possibly ammonium.

What I can tell you is I had a positive result almost immediately and it makes sense.

Apparently in every litre of Human Urine there is roughly 8 grams of nitrogen, how much is immediately available may be different but ammonia is known to be very plant available.

Because I have clay pellets I have a very good substrate for aerobic bacteria, and today I noticed there is zero Ammonia smell coming from the bubble bucket.

I may treat theae plants like corn 🌽 and supplement urea 3x weekly, we'll see how it progresses on one application a week.

Other supplements I use are liquid kelp extract, MgSO4, MKP, Iron Chelate.

-Cheers

cincinnana

Are you planning to move the plant outdoors in the natural sunlight?

My plant did pretty good outdoors while off the grow lights for the summer.

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Limnobium

I'm going to upgrade the plants light supplementation and make a 300w setup for it shortly.

30 000 lumens.