Gabe15

As some of your may know, I am a banana researcher in Hawaii, and I would like to share some of my work documenting Pacific banana varieties from 3 expeditions in 2019. Enjoy!

Cook Islands:
https://repo.mel.cgiar.org/handle/20.500.11766/12873

Samoa:
https://repo.mel.cgiar.org/handle/20.500.11766/12874

West New Britain, PNG:
https://repo.mel.cgiar.org/handle/20.500.11766/12875

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

smeash

Very cool! Thanks Gabe!

Mikemooreflorida

Nice, will sit down and read the first one now.

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Current varieties:
Dwarf Cavendish Fruited , Apple Mansano TC unconfirmed, Rajapuri TC Fruited, Gold Finger TC unconfirmed, Dwarf Namwa TC Fruited, Dwarf Orinoco TC Fruited, Sweetheart FHIA-03 Fruited, Tall Red banana Fruited, Blue Java Fruited, Tall Namwa Fruited, Pisang Raja Fruited, Hua Moa TC Stunted, Dwarf Brazilian Fruited, High Gate unconfirmed, Tall Brazilian Fruited, Kokopo unconfirmed, FHIA-17 Fruited, Dwarf Plantain Fruited.

sirdoofus

Wow, that's a lot of bananas! But then maybe that's just my relatively ignorant, northern perspective?

Thanks for sharing!

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Who keeps calling me nuts??

Valor_X

Amazing research! Very good read. Tons of info and pictures, Thanks!

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Varieties I'm Growing

From Corm/Pup
Dwarf Cavendish ○ Super Dwarf Cavendish ○ Grand Nain ○ Niño ○ Manzano ○ Raja Puri ○ Tall Namwah ○ Blue Java ○ 1000 Fingers ○ Praying Hands ○ Orinoco ○ Variegated Florida ○ PR Red ○ California Gold ○ FHIA-03 Sweetheart

Plantains
Puerto Rican Dwarf Plantain ○ African Rhino Horn

From TC
Truly Tiny ○ Manzano ○ "Blue Java" ○ Dwarf Namwah ○ Thai Black ○ Veinte Cohol

Yug

Gabe, for all your banana travels / explorations what was one of the most surprising things you learned or found, and what was something you discovered that completely defied explanation? (like, if you found a banana growing in an extremely remote location and had no clue as to how it ever got there, and its nearest genetic relative banana was found thousands of miles away - something like that)

Gabe15

When I was younger I think I must have thought that I could see every variety of banana, but after having seeing so many, I realize that it is an impossible goal, and that there is no way to know how many there are or to see them all, so there will always be new things to see.

I've come across a number of bananas which are confusing or mysterious in their genetic background and relationships to other known things, what has surprised me is the amount of genetic diversity which is still unknown or unclear. It's one thing to find new cultivars within a known genetic group, but I suppose I've been surprised at how many new genetic groups we have also found, some of which we don't know where they came from or what they are related to.

Here is another article detailing one such cultivar, 'Menengan' in Madang, PNG.

https://www.promusa.org/blogpost656-...s-expectations

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

Akula

Thanks for sharing the results of your expeditions. I found the different colors of the bananas (inside and out) interesting. Pretty cool!!

Gabe, not too long ago you mentioned a banana plant you may bring to the market that is a dwarf/mini-dwarf that fruits nice size bananas. Any news or developments, photos, etc. on that?

Thanks again!

Yug

How does an 11 chromosome plant cross with a 10 chromosome one? Didn't think that possible. Seems like a banana 'mule' (horse x burro)

sirdoofus

Sounds like it surprised everyone. Not that I know squat about banana genetics, or plant genetics in general, but I found the following quote intriguing:

"This hybrid shouldn’t exist. Yet it does"

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Who keeps calling me nuts??

Valor_X

What blows my mind is how many different seedless edible varieties/hybrids exist, and how Gabe keeps finding new ones.

How are there so many when successfully breeding a new variety is extremely difficult?

Phil Rowe, who led the FHIA breeding program for many years before his death in 2003, invented the now-standard procedure for creating banana hybrids. The first step is to gather as much pollen as possible from the chosen male parent and use it to fertilize potential female parents at the flowering stage. Next comes a four- or five-month wait for the plants to produce fruit. Then the bananas are harvested, peeled by hand and pressed through a sieve. A ton of fruit might yield a handful of seeds, less than half of which will germinate naturally. After the precious few seedlings are planted comes another 9- to 18-month wait.

Were people actively trying to breed new varieties? Or did people just plant the 1 in a Million seed they found in a edible banana?

Apparently it was only until the 16th century Spanish explorers carried bananas from Africa’s west coast to Latin America.

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Varieties I'm Growing

From Corm/Pup
Dwarf Cavendish ○ Super Dwarf Cavendish ○ Grand Nain ○ Niño ○ Manzano ○ Raja Puri ○ Tall Namwah ○ Blue Java ○ 1000 Fingers ○ Praying Hands ○ Orinoco ○ Variegated Florida ○ PR Red ○ California Gold ○ FHIA-03 Sweetheart

Plantains
Puerto Rican Dwarf Plantain ○ African Rhino Horn

From TC
Truly Tiny ○ Manzano ○ "Blue Java" ○ Dwarf Namwah ○ Thai Black ○ Veinte Cohol

cincinnana

Great post.....

The U.S has the most views for those links.

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AaronTT

I am highly interested in that too. I want to compare it to mine. I was given a variety that I was told is from Jamaica. Its a super dwarf, and produces very reliably in poor soil. I seen it fruit in almost pure sand, and no extra irrigation. Although the bunches were small, I thought it is impressive to even fruit in those conditions.

Mudturkle

What do I have to do to be able to read this? I tried to join MEL and it said that it was unable to send an email.

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Central Texas Zone 8B and Gulf Coast zone 9B: Raja Puri, Dw. Brazilian, Dw. Orinoco, Dw. NamWah, Dw. Cavendish, Dw. Green?, Dw. Red? Iholena Tigua, Veinte Cohol, Misi Luki, Pisang Raja.

cincinnana

Once you open the link .
On the left side right below the photo and above authors names is VIEW/OPEN.
Click view /open and download the file.....or you may just read from that pane.

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