What's wrong with my Red Iholene?
 

Hello,

I am having some problems with my bananas and would like your help in identifying the causal agent and what to do.
The first banana i would like your help about is a Red Iholene that didnt show much growth in the couple of months i have it and recently,its lower leaf yellowed slightly,bent and mostly died. Its now soft at the base of the petiole but seems to be stoping there. Here is a photo of the soft but starting to dehydrate,base.Its greying in color.


Here are some photos of the plant as well




The yellowing leafs.The color is more orange than yellow in reality and appears like its in small spots that are close together












Leaf underside


The oldest live leaf




Various leaf shots
















This banana also has a black but hard area at the base of its oldest leaf sheath. It appears partly dried out and caves inwards. It appears like the plant has contained whatever caused it but while removing a couple dead leaf sheaths,i accidentally peeled this area back a little. Here is what it looks like














I also found a few black blotches(not just color,they are slightly caved in)




So,after showing you all these,what do you think my Red Iholene has? What caused the things i showed you?

Thank you very much in advance! :)

Re: What's wrong with my Red Iholene?
 

I can't really tell what ur problem is, but if I see it correctly, u might have a spider mite problem on the underside of ur leaves... and they could be responsible for the yellowing of the leaves, thats what they do with my nana's XD.

U should check for really small spider like moving dots on the undersides of the leaves, Also check the healthy leaves!

If it's not that, then i cannot help u.

greets,
Dries

Re: What's wrong with my Red Iholene?
 

Thank you very much for your reply Dries! :)

Good eye! I do have spider mites and just today did i address the problem. I brought and released predatory mites to my basement and they should take care of the spider mite problem within a week!
But,do spider mites cause yellowing in a pattern such as seen in my photos?


In addition to that,what else do you think my Red Iholene has?

Thank you very much in advance! :)

Re: What's wrong with my Red Iholene?
 

well..... i'm quite a noob when it comes to: why is my nana dropping his leaves or yellowing them? So i can't really give an answer to your other problems. I just noticed that ur leaves where yellowing in sort of the same way as mine do when the spidermite infestation got bigger, with more damage...

What im trying to do now, is misting the leaves as often as i can, and this whole week and a bit last week i havent seen a single new spider mite, so this might be my easy solution to pass this winter without too much spider mite problems... Last winter i almost constantly had infestations of spider mites wrekking my new leafs :(

greets and lots of succes,
Dries

Re: What's wrong with my Red Iholene?
 

Thank you very much for your reply Dries! :)

Its great to hear this is just typical spider mite damage! The predatory mites solve this problem once and for all with no labor from my part! Its great to hear you are getting yours under control as well :)


Lets see what the others think of the black,caved in but hard, blotches on the pseudostem...



Wish you lots of success as well!!! :)

Re: What's wrong with my Red Iholene?
 

Hi Kostas

Red musa a very fussy,they like to be kept growing,whether its siam ruby,kru,dwarf red,red iholene,beside the red spider mite problem,i see no perlite added into your pot mix perlite is very important for growing bananas in pots,outside tropical conditions as it gives air to roots and is very free draining.

Is there any bright light entering where you have it,and what are the temps.

Re: What's wrong with my Red Iholene?
 

Hi mushtaq86,

I am growing a Red in there relatively ok and its fast growing so far! :)

My Red Iholene is planted in a relatively fast draining medium with sand added for drainage and kept on the dry side but with plenty of moisture at the bottom half of the pot. Its not the best medium but its a decent one and kept relatively dry,it served me ok last year with 2 other bananas. Since last week,i am using a better mixture for my bananas but this one and most of my bananas,were repotted earlier and are in the old mixture.

There is no natural sunlight where its growing but it gets fluorescent lighting. Temperature is at 24C and humidity is very high(droplets fall from the ceiling....). Air circulation is not good though and that is a call for problems but i dont have a fan i can use for the time being.

Re: What's wrong with my Red Iholene?
 

The problem could be the humidity is way to high for the amount of light the nana is receiving,you would have to give it around 10 to 12 hours of bright light,for temps in their mid twenty's

I would take the temps down to 18c, as the nana would grow slowly with the amount of artificial light it is receiving,which would cause it less stress

You definitely need a fan in there to keep the air moving,to keep mould and fungus out.

Re: What's wrong with my Red Iholene?
 

I still don't know much about bananas, but with my orchids, spider mites will get on the leaves if I keep them too dry. I can usually get rid of them by using neem oil, or insecticidal soap sprays every 3 days or so.