Gabe15

Something also that is still a mystery of banana seeds is the differences between individual seeds. In some species, it is becoming clear that not all seeds are created equally. Even within the same bunch of fruit, with the same pollen source, there are "sets" of seeds that seem to want to germinate at specific times. For example, (not real data) 20% of the seeds may germinate within 2 weeks, 20% may germinate after one month, 20% may germinate after 3 months, 20% may germinate after 6 months, and the last 20% may germinate after 1 year. The thing is though, that sometimes you will notice that banana seeds come up in sets, like 3 may come up at the exact same time, and 3 more at another time. It is clear that there are different chemical inhibitors in some of these species that directly dictate how soon the seed is able to germinate. It is my belief that this is a brilliant mechanism to allow seeds "travel time" in order to not only have them dispersed over a wide area, but have them stay dormant for long enough to make the journey to wherever it is they are going. There is still a lot of experimentation and studying to be done regarding this subject, but there are some newly found insights that are becoming noticed.

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