jjjankovsky

unlike some of you folk who are coaxing these plants along in your apartments and yards up north...i have some large treelike things in my yard that show up with heavy groups of fruit...that will topple the stem, or i can cut the fruit and wait for the good stuff...

the question: When do you cut your bundle of bananas with some hope of eating same??

Patty in Wisc

From reading here, wait till the nanas are plumped out & starting to turn color.

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Patty




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Patty in Wisc has sadly passed away 9/05/11. We will miss you Patty.

island cassie

Hi there JJ - if the bunch looks too heavy for the stem - prop it up until the first finger turns yellow. We use props and braces all the time as we have very strong winds here. Somewhere on this site are descriptions of poles and braces used to support plants. If you can hold them up , it is so much better than cutting them down early.

Bananaman88

I'll have a "how-to" article on building a bunch prop in an upcoming issue of the magazine. Not sure which one Lorax is putting it in yet.

lorax

Issue 3, which will be too late for John at the rate his bananas are going.

SO: John, I use lengths of construction bamboo padded with burlap, and just wedge them in under the bunch to prevent the plant from toppling. If it's a particularly big bunch (the Giant Plantains come to mind) then I use two. There are more elegant solutions, but this is what's used in the plantations.

jjjankovsky

if i get chores done this morning (hunting for sprouted cocos in the next property), i'll go down the road to the delta of the Rio Marabasco and take some photos...it now seems that all those heavy strings in the plantations are for tying up the fruit to other stems...i thought it was for wind...

harveyc

Just another option from discussion at supporting fruit with pvc...did I do it right? pics in gallery. I've seen it in use in person and it works well for Jon.

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Patty in Wisc

Oh, I wish I had this problem!

__________________
Got a lite?
Patty




____
Patty in Wisc has sadly passed away 9/05/11. We will miss you Patty.

harveyc

LOL, Patty, many of us are in the same boat...I'm still waiting for my first bloom of 2009. I had some large plants coming out okay from this winter but it's been a cooler spring and summer than normal except for two brief hot spells.

I also remembered the photo Chris posted in his thread at Bananas which shows pretty well how he used bamboo to support his saba:

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jjjankovsky

i have some pics but cannot find my way to the sticky that instructs how to do pics...help!

john_ny

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John

jjjankovsky

well...the one photo that shows some orange twine is resting safely with an exact copy that i uploaded (thought i was sending 7 of them)...so, enough of that nonsense today...it's just about time for a cold drink to help me live with my limitations...

i went to the bananas today and found twine going in all directions to do dual purpose: hold up the fruit and try to keep the tree up in high wind...

we have hurricanes sail past offshore about 4-9 times/year.

a fellow showed me a new variety called "Macho Chaparo" that grows to about 8 feet instead of the usual 15-19', and is hoped to be a good producer and not topple...

on the way home i stopped and saw men planting another variety which i think he indicated was of "commercial" quality (you eat it right out of the skin rather than having to cook it)...called "Enono Gigantic"...and he gave me 2 bagged-up starts!

not a bad day, if we don't talk about my computer skills...

harveyc

While you goof off and have a cold one, I'll slave away and post one of your photos in your thread!



Some nice bananas, there!

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jjjankovsky

ARGGGGGGHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!...this is tartin' to piss me off...i'm not even going to ask how you can post my pic...

i'll describe it.

if you smart guys out there have the right moves, you can zoom in and see the orange twine holding probably tons of stuff off the ground...the bags (more frequently newspaper wraps here) are to prevent bruising marks on the fruit from the daily rubbing against (other banannas?)...

these are the tall 'machos', which the farmer told me are the major crop here, for processing into all those things made from yellow fruit...but he also has the tiny yellow ones and red ones i remember to be so sweet when i ate them with my first wife in costa rica in the '70's...(nope, wasn't smokin' them too)

i'll get better at my photos...

harveyc

Hey, we've all been in your frustrated position at one time. A little bit more trying, and you'll get the hang of it.

I had clicked on "jjjankovsky's Photo Gallery" under your user name on the left side of your post to get to your gallery. Once there, I selected one of your photos (both were the same, as you stated) by clicking on it once. Once that photo is selected, below that are some code options. I picked the code in the box that follows "Code for bulletin boards:" and pasted it into my post. I think that is explained in the link that John posted above.

To view a larger version of the photo I posted above someone just needs to click onto the photo and that will take the person to viewing the photo in your gallery. Once there, below the boxes of code and the file name is a link titled "Click on image to view larger image". Click on that and we see the larger image.

Hope that helps. If not, have a beer or margarita for me!

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jjjankovsky

harvey...i'll sort it out soon...

gardening forums are fun for us here...but...i'd like somebody who has the problem of plant life crawling over everywhere (no mater what we do for garden protection) to speak with us...

we're pretty good gardeners but have no clue about keeping creeping jungle weeds away...the problem is the weeds...the natural plants...the amount of water in the soil year around...

perhaps a referral to a tropical gardening spot?

stay tuned...lots of musas here!

lorax

John, I've got that problem. Freeking jungle weeds.

jjjankovsky

i had a chat with this old guy and he advised herbal remedy...like kick back and enjoy it!