Basjoofriend

Hi jmoore,

now I planted different wild species at my pond in my yard in Brazil, one special garden for the wild species of Musa. There are bananas thriving very well because of the canopy of trees and high groundwater level by the pond. I already have planted there into the special garden Musa balbisiana, mannii, ornata, ornata x velutina, velutina, formosana, itinerans, microcarpa, schizocarpa, gigantea ssp. xishuangbannaensis, siamensis "Thai Gold", zebrina, Burmese Blue, sikkimensis and basjoo "Sakhalin" from Baldur Garten, also Ensete ventrichosum. My housekeeper has planted three Nanição alias Dwarf Cavendish there 3 years ago, they grew very well and were the biggest of my garden, even one has fruited last year, but the frost of 28F on 28th June 2011 killed the fruits, but all of the bananas there at the pond were came back very well. Some days ago I have cleaned the place of one large dead tree which has died by frost. My housekeeper has cutten the dead tree completly and I wasted the branches and the trunk of the dead tree, so that the place is now clean. I have already planted Musa zebrina and Burmese Blue there, but there is still place for more wild species like Musa campestris, thomsonii, sikkimensis, laterita, peekelii, hirta and more. So 8 to 10 plants more. And I saw that one Musa "São Tomé" is grown much better in the shadow of one tree at my house in the red claw, another "Säo Tomé" had problems in the sun in the red clay, so that I have transplanted it now into the canopy of one mango tree at the vegetable garden of my housekeeper so that it will do better. I will take some new photos of my banana special garden at the pond soon.

And my friend Helton got some pups of my basjoo, now he has 6 plants. He and I will breed with Musa basjoo. I self have 5 plants of Musa basjoo, one motherplant and 3 pups in Brazil and one grandmaplant in Germany, I took one pup from Germany 3 years ago to Brazil. I do not know whether Musa peekelii and hirta might be crossable with Musa basjoo, but I will try ist. But at first I will try to cross Musa basjoo with itinerans, sikkimensis, Mysore, balbisiana and microcarpa, later also with schizocarpa, peekelii and hirta.

Best wishes
Joachim