venturabananas

This is based on advice from others, not personal experience, because frost is a rarity at my house, so take it for what it's worth. Basically you need to watch your banana plants carefully enough that you learn when a pup that comes up in any particular month will flower. You then remove all pups that come up in other months that will cause them to flower so late that any bunch they produce will be ruined by frost. You might find, for example, that pups that come up in Feb-May of one year will flower by June-July of the next year, giving them enough time to ripen the bunch before frost in say December. A wrinkle is that you don't want them to flower right after winter, when all their leaves have been burned off by frost and so they don't have the energy to fill the fruit.

It sounds pretty simple in theory, but requires meticulous observations and records on your part to make it work. I know a couple of guys who use this system effectively.

If you still have a couple months of potential growth before your first frost, then I'd probably remove the plants with bunches that you are sure are going to be killed by frost. Then they won't be shading pups that can grow a little faster and maybe fruit in late spring/early summer next year.

Good luck.

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