Tallest largest Banana plant personaly grown
 

Just curious, whats the largest banana plant that anyone on here has personaly grown? I would imagine its a Saba, but maybe someone else has some suprises. I only have one growing season on the sabas so my largest ones are only about 12 feet tall and about 10 inches in diameter.

Re: Tallest largest Banana plant personaly grown
 

I haven't grown any in the ground yet, but hope to have one of my M. peekelii in the ground if I can find a good spot. The plants I collected from were about 25-30ft tall or so.

The tallest plant I have personally grown isn't that impressive, it was my M. muluensis which got about 8ft in a container indoors. Though my 'Williams' bananas are about full grown now, but maybe only 7ft pseudostem right now.

Musa peekelii

Re: Tallest largest Banana plant personaly grown
 

About 20 feet, a mature Ecuadorian variety plantain.

Re: Tallest largest Banana plant personaly grown
 

Saba -
http://www.bananas.org/f2/my-saba-ha...08-a-5534.html
I cut the plant and dug it up entirely for my move shortly after the pictures were taken, it would have been larger the next season had I not cut it. I would peg that one that bloomed at +- 11' of pseudostem. I do wish I measured it! I did weigh the bunch though and it was 65lbs.

Re: Tallest largest Banana plant personaly grown
 

That Musa peekelii is a pretty cool looking tree. Looks like it would be pretty cold sensitve though.

Re: Tallest largest Banana plant personaly grown
 

My largest ice cream banana in the driveway was 14 feet tall to the top of the leaves, this fall we had to chop it to 6' to get it into the greenhouse this fall. It's growing back though.
The funny thing is that it's potted and that tall. We have to tie it to the garage to keep it standing because we get so much wind. That's my personal biggest so far.

Re: Tallest largest Banana plant personaly grown
 

My ice creams are about 10ft at the moment, we will see what happens in the spring.

Re: Tallest largest Banana plant personaly grown
 

10' to the tip of the crown or pseudostem?

Re: Tallest largest Banana plant personaly grown
 

The tops of the stems range from about 7 to 9 feet and the tops of the plants probably about 9 to 11 feet, depending on the plant. The leaves are pretty tore up right now due to the winter and the windy conditions lately. So they are not as high above the stem as they would normaly be.

Re: Tallest largest Banana plant personaly grown
 

My "Dwarf" Brazilian reached 10' of pseudostem before Hurricane Rita snapped 7' off of it. It didn't even suggest it was ready to flower. I guess we just grow them bigger down here in Texas. ;)

This is a picture from earlier in this past Summer:

Re: Tallest largest Banana plant personaly grown
 

Only 7' here with a Basjoo. So I've got a lot of catching up to do. I'm putting some Sabas, Ice Creams, and a Praying Hands in the ground this coming spring though. The Ice Cream have really taken off indoors in their pots. So I'm hoping I'll get several feet off them before next winter. Will likely dig them up and pot with no leaves - this cold spell we've had this last week scares me and I don't want to risk them outdoors.

Re: Tallest largest Banana plant personaly grown
 

That's pretty good seeing as you are getting iced out where you are at.

Re: Tallest largest Banana plant personaly grown
 

Both my Orinocos and Ice Creams have about 19ft of pstem and are huge around the bottom, the IC's being bigger around the base - it is hssing down with rain atm so I won't go out to measure them. They are so big it is difficult to photograph them as I can't get far enough away without things getting in the way. Lately I have started to think fondly of the dwarf varieties after getting the gardeners to cut down the last bunch of Orinocos from about 12ft up - they caught them ok - I think the bunch only weighs about 60lbs so much smaller than usual. It is the rainy season and in the last week we have had 4 inches of rain - last year we had 96 inches which was the equivalent of a dry year - the year before was 112 inches! All this heat and water makes the nanas grow well.

Re: Tallest largest Banana plant personaly grown
 

Wow! I wonder if its the water or the heat or the relative humidity. I have a pretty much unlimited supply of water here as I have my own well, and tons of heat except for about 2 and a half months a year. I have been afraid of over watering but I guess during the summer it would be almost impossible given the type of rainfall you are getting. If it's the humidity I may try misters this summer.

Re: Tallest largest Banana plant personaly grown
 

lt - they are monsters - when it stops raining I will get some measurements around the bases of the plants. I think the humidity plays a big part but they do suck up the water too - I wouldn't be afraid of watering them too much if you have the high temperatures to go with it - mine love water and hot weather - i am just waiting for the hot weather to start to make the plants put on a spurt of growth - cold here atm at about 73f/22c - the dogs are curled up on their beds and won't move!

Re: Tallest largest Banana plant personaly grown
 

I had to wrap that big one up a lot - man I just hope it doesn't loose much off the top. This cold (for this long) is just unusual for us. Thankfully it's getting a little warmer again - back to near normal.

I envy you guys in the warmer spots with the huge bananas. I doubt I'll ever get one over 12' here without hibernation. I've got A LOT of reading to do here about the various species and how they hibernate (I wish that was included in the Wiki for each banana).

Reading the above, can you even possibly over water a banana in the ground (so long as it's not sitting in a bog like setting)? I often think I'm not giving mine enough, but don't want to over do it in the summer. We have NO clay here in Lexington, SC - turns to sand mostly if you dig down enough, luckily this area was very forested before the neighborhood was built - good top soil mix overall. So weird too, less than 25 miles away where I grew up they have more clay than you know what to do with. I've never seen types of soil change so fast in such a small area.

Re: Tallest largest Banana plant personaly grown
 

We have mostly sandy soil here, but I trucked in 120 tons of top soil and I put about 12 cubic feet of potting soil with every banana I plant, so I'm not sure how much water they can take with that mixture. On summer days I have been giving them about 10 hrs a day with 2 2gpm drippers per plant so about 40 gallons every 2 or 3 days. If they can take more I'll let them have it.

Re: Tallest largest Banana plant personaly grown
 

That can't be too kind on the water bill, LOL. I really need to get a drip hose irrigation system this spring myself - maybe I can tie it into my existing irrigation system. I am no doubt wasting a ton of water spraying it onto all the tropical plants in my beds. Half of it probably evaporates in mist during the spray from the sprinkler system.

Re: Tallest largest Banana plant personaly grown
 

I have a well so I dont actually get a water bill. If more water will make them grow faster and larger, thats no problem for me!

Re: Tallest largest Banana plant personaly grown
 

I bet out there in Arizona you can't get too much water on those bananas. It seems like they take a ton of water here in Indiana in the summer and we actually have humidity, very high humidity a lot of the summer. And not nearly as hot and strong sun as you get.

Island Cassie, I sure hope my ice cream banana isn't a clone from the same batch as yours! I don't think I have room for bananas that big in the winter. It's getting iffy now as big as it is, and its growing back quick in the greenhouse. I've been trying to control it by giving it less water, with limited success. Partly because that doesn't seem to work as well as I thought it would, and partly because I feel sorry for it every now and then and water it! I don't know if I'm ever going to get bananas on it, because I thought I'd already have them by now...