SalsaKing

I planted a saba pup and a bordelon early in the year in 2004. They're giant now, lookin forward to my first bloom on hopefully both of em. The biggest saba is a little over 20 feet high with nearly a 16" diameter trunk. Those are supposedly Borneo Giant's to the left at about 6' high which are starting to take off also.







The saba i got from bananaplants.net in 2003 or so, and i had given up on it at first, i thought it had died. There was nothing above the ground in a 1 gallon pot, then all the sudden with some rain up came a tiny little pup. And look at it now!

mikevan

Gonna get me a saba here pretty soon, fingers crossed! Having the time-lapsed pictures is really illuminating on how your garden has evolved over the years. Really neat!

Be well,
Mike

tlturbo

Cool - my saba are about 5 feet tall so can't wait.
Do you know the variety of that Alocasia or Colocasia (elephant ear type plant) next to the Saba and do you want to sell a pup from it if you have one?

Terry

SalsaKing

I'm starting to think its the Alocasia Macrorrhiza which is sometimes sold as a Borneo Giant but it's supposed to be Alocasia robusta, which is the biggest of em all. Either way it's starting to look amazing with it's awesome leaves and now it's also growing very quick.

I would be a little afraid to try to take a pup off of it, it hasn't put one out for almost a year though. However there isn't much room for any more so will figure that out when it finally does pup again.

mikevan

Get yerself a xanthosoma sagittifolium - gets 9' tall with 5' long leaves. Gorgeous plant! I have one in a container that's already pushing up a small pup and about to explode out of its container - gonna have to pot up pronto!

Be well,
Mike

JoeReal

That's a nice one.

I've got a saba plant from one of the online stores. Can't remember which one at the moment, but they were recommended as a good source.

My saba plant dies back to the ground every winter. It comes back to life every spring, grows very slow, maybe up to 3.5 ft at the trunk, and then dies back again. Saba is rated as cold hardy, but not cold hardy enough at the pseudostem. So i don't think that saba is cold hardy. Either that or my tree was mislabeled.

This year I did differently. I covered it with a big plastic container during the frosty nights, and it was able to hold up its pseudostem the entire past winter. It is now growing again, steadily and hope it will reach more than 4 ft this year. One thing for sure, it is stouter and have more leaves at this same time of the year than last year.

SalsaKing

That's kind of odd that it dies back to the ground in zone 9. I'm in Lake Camanche (near Jackson, CA) which is just a tad higher elevation than Davis, and it has no problem surviving the winter, just it's leaves die. The bordelon has some troubles, it seems to keep about half its p-stem. But the saba just pauses for a few months than takes off where it left off the season before. Its right next to the house though (mainly for wind protection), so maybe that helps it keep warm in the winter?

halo

Beautiful pictures!