Quote:
Originally Posted by momoese
Quite few years back I though it would be a good idea to shred banana plants and spread them about 6 inches thick all through the banana garden in hopes it would keep the soil warm. Then we had quite a bit of rain and cold temps. Come early spring I decided to see what the soil looked like because the plants were not growing. It was black slime with no signs of life at all. All the cut down pseudo-stems and corms were rotting and smelled like rotting fish. It took me weeks to clear all the mess and get the soil somewhat dried out and back to normal. I continued to remove rot from plants well into spring. I won't be doing that again!
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Wow, I have been using that same technique for 15 years and it works great here.
My entire growing strategy is based on this technique and I have not been able to find anything that works better.
My goal is a minimum of 6" after being compacted, the crushed pseudostems also works perfectly.
It seems a little odd that the climate makes that much of a difference, but that explains quite a bit about the differences with water and nutrients and even why you guys seemed satisfied with 5'-10' feeder roots.
At least now you know you had a great idea, just the wrong climate.
Thanks for the info, Mitchel.