Re: Ae Ae Albino
Ryan,
Thanks for the photo. There might be some others at the large research libraries, like Columbia or The Library of Congress, but aside from that, have you seen any other photos? Do you guys have photos from when it was younger? Is the "parent" all green or variegated? Are the other plants to it's right green or variegated? It is hard to tell with the glare on the leaves
This plant is one of the master-works of nature's engineering.
You seem to imply that the "parent" had not yielded bananas. If so, then the albino feeding off the parent kept it from producing. Here is something else to consider, maybe the "parent" is not genetically coded to produce bananas, but the albino instead. It could be that the stalks in the colony have different jobs, in other words, they are specialists.
Perhaps the foremost specialty is that the green plants grow tall to give protection to the variegated from the continuous direct rays of the sun. Those in turn protect the albino. The albino might be coded to do something else beside be albino. I hope you guys get some bananas from this so we can all see pictures.
Your friend's albino is not just a rare occurrence in itself, but the fact that he let it grow is more amazing still, because people usually cut it down believing it could not live independently of other banana plants. And they are probably right. And since their intention is toward commercial production, they had no interest in letting them live. (Unless there is a very strong colony, it would not seem an albino could give birth to another albino.) Since no one lets them grow to maturity, we can all learn from what you two are doing.
Judging by the girth of the nearby stems, I would say the soil is weak. The girth also indicates that if they had bananas, they would need support to stay up. Same with the albino. So you and he will have to give extra attention in caring for it.
The major thing is to protect it from the wind. I have had Orinoco stems grow to 15 feet and supported by an open-ended, inverted "V" made of 2 by 4s. The support has to be about 2/3s of the way up the stem because this is where most of the stress is when the bananas come out -- not half way up. People who put supports half way up find the plant falls over from wind and weight.
Additionally, putting the support against the stem is not enough. If the wind comes from the direction the plant is leaning into and there is no support on the other side, it can fall "backwards." This is very disappointing when after nine months to a year off waiting for a first harvest they fall over before they are ready. To prevent this from happening, we wrap ½ inch rope twice around the stalk and tie it to the top of the inverted "V." That keeps it from falling backward. But with this fella, I would be more supportive, so to speak.
If I were you, I would support the parent and the offspring by sinking six 2 x 4s in the ground in a rectangular pattern far enough from the stalks so as not to do the dense root structure too much harm. I would stabilize these with cross bars half way up and at the top. The height of the structure should be at least 2/3s of the way up the tallest stalk. I would then tie ropes from the wooden structure to 2/3s and about half way up the pants from three different directions, almost at equal angles. This will maximize the stability due to wind and weight. The plants should keep their natural tilt.
As a friend of mine once said as regards to growing banana plants: the best food for a banana is another banana. This appears particularly so for the albino your friend has. It does not seem that it will feed from its neighbors to the right in the photo. There is no direct contact. If this is so, it could be that it will stop growing when the parent dies. Giving it fertilizers may not do any good since it apparently cannot synthesize its own food.
The clue as to how to feed it comes from the method to grow giant pumpkins, feed it intravenously. Fluids would have to be extracted from its related plants and then drip-pumped into the albino. This is only a contingency plan and only if your are interested in seeing what happens when the plant lives out its cycle.
No one has cared about doing any of this because it was not going to be of commercial value. If there is any information around, I suspect it is squirreled away in a draw, trunk or library of someone descended from someone who experimented with it in the 1940s and 50s.
I have seen naturally growing colonies of bananas with diameters of 10 to 15 feet. These were in rain forests and in flat lands with a marl type soil. The colonies die out, probably from exhausting the soil. If given manures, I suspect they could get bigger. The albino banana would probably thrive in a properly nurtured colony because it would have a strong, healthy parent to feed it and relatives to protect it. Probably several albinos could grow in such a colony.
Thanks again for the photo.
D.O. Christian Rieger
Last edited by Christian Rieger : 05-09-2010 at 08:19 PM.
Reason: Correct typo and add words
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