Quote:
Originally Posted by ifnull
This may be a dumb question but, is it possible they mutated? They didn't start growing to this size until shortly after I planted the tall Namwah on the other side of the yard.
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It's not a dumb question. Many of varieties of bananas are somatic mutants. As I understand it, all the varieties within a subgroup (e.g., all Cavendish varieties) are somatic mutants of an original variety. As a specific example, Williams was a somatic mutant that showed up in a field of Dwarf Cavendish.
That said, height is not a definitive trait of dwarfism. Tall varieties can fruit at short heights under certain conditions (e.g., poor conditions or first fruiting on a mat). And, some non-dwarf varieties are short, e.g., Rose and some other AA genome cultivars.
Here are a couple of photos of real Dwarf Namwah plants. Note how stout the p-stem is and how there is very little space between the leaves.
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