paradisi

A common banana in Australia, but as I'm new here I thought I'd bore you with pics of them.






The tallest leaves reach up well past 8 metres.

The last three bunches we have picked have all weighed nearly 30kg and had 50-60 bananas on each, I don't think the winter bunches (the three we have growing at the moment) will reach that size, but who cares, they taste so good.

I live in Queensland - where the government is run by the banana growing industry. We can only grow Ladyfinger, Blue Java, Ducasse, Goldfinger, Bluggoe (plantain or cooking banana), and Kluai Namwa Khom (Dwarf Ducasse) and Pisang Ceylan and are limited to ten plants in total.

Seeded bananas are cancerous (or so the government would have us believe) and the government can and does invade private property to destroy illegal bananas. We are a democracy LOL.

__________________
The universe is my eyes and ears. All else is hearsay.

http://opinonated-bastard.blogspot.com/

Bananaman88

Welcome to the org, Paradisi! Thanks for sharing your pictures. Why would the government want people to think that seeded bananas are cancerous?

magicgreen

Your pictures are great!!! Thanks for giving us information about the other side of the world!

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(Started growing bananas July 2007)
(Zone 6)

paradisi

that's the impression plant collectors get whenever we try to convince government officials or politicians that having a seeded banana won;t be the end of the world. I'm pretty sure that Australia has a native banana, but I can't have one because of the government regulations - brought into place at the behest of the commercial growers.

__________________
The universe is my eyes and ears. All else is hearsay.

http://opinonated-bastard.blogspot.com/

Tropicallvr

Thanks for sharing. If I were you I'd probably would'nt listen to the Gov and go collect some of those native species. In the US they are afraid of bamboo, and it's tougher to get seeds, on the bambooinfo.web forum a guy in Florida had all his Ebay bought bamboo seeds(now plants) confiscated by some branch of homeland security. It worried me a little because I bought some from the same seller. Oh well catch me if you can, lol.

paradisi

I don't listen (very often) but getting up to Cape York (the pointy bit at the top of Queensland) is too long a drive

Bamboo is confiscated by homeland security - - why??

sounds even worse than our banana police - at least we have a banana industry they are supposedly trying to protect

__________________
The universe is my eyes and ears. All else is hearsay.

http://opinonated-bastard.blogspot.com/

hersirsmiley

they may be stopping bamboo because they don't want it getting out of control and establishing itself thereby destroying the fragile ecosystem in the countries of the south pacific. its just a possible reason, not saying its the actual reason.

__________________
"If the women don't find you handsome they should at least find you handy." -Red Green

thebes11

Ummmm, Florida isn't in the south pacific....

Tropicallvr

From the bamboo books I've read there was a push to use bamboo for a paper pulp source in the south east US. There were a few big interests that wanted the loblolly pine used instead, so they stopped bamboo seed importation around that time "because the possiblitly of grain crops being effected by an imported disease".

Sorry I was mistaken, it wasn't homeland security, but some smuggling, trade, ect officers, but still a little scary non the less.
bambooweb.info :: View topic - EBAY Bamboo

I'd like to say right now that none of mine sprouted.