Can you chop ensete glaucum to get pups?
 

I have an ensete glaucum and I wouldn't mind having a few more. Does any one know if you can chop them and destroy them like the ensete maurelii to get pups?
Or do you think this is another experiment that I should undertake in the interest of science? The plant is about a year old now.

Re: Can you chop ensete glaucum to get pups?
 

I would really think about letting it fruit and then use the seeds, it's easier that way, isn't it?

Re: Can you chop ensete glaucum to get pups?
 

I would assume you could, the process should be the same. Allowing it to fruit and get seeds does seem safer. You just may have to pollinate it yourself, though.

Re: Can you chop ensete glaucum to get pups?
 

I don't think ensete glaucum produce pups, or take kindley to being chopped up. I think the only ensete that may produce pups is ventricosum, but only mature ones.

But hey, they grow readily from seed so give it a go.

Re: Can you chop ensete glaucum to get pups?
 

That answers it, use winter protection if needed and wait for seeds, each 'banana' will be full of them.

Good luck germinating, but that's another thread ;)

Just do the stuff, as mother nature intended it to be done...

Re: Can you chop ensete glaucum to get pups?
 

Hey Sandy, give it a shot as you have a spare plant for it. Mine are all too small to experiment on. I find the E glaucum very easy to germinate and maybe as a result of its resilience it may just regenerate itself with pups. I am most eager to follow your progress.

Re: Can you chop ensete glaucum to get pups?
 

[quote=jmoore;62267]I don't think ensete glaucum produce pups, or take kindley to being chopped up. I think the only ensete that may produce pups is ventricosum, but only mature ones.


As a rule, no Ensete species produce pups unless induced to do so. The process that Sandy is asking about invloves chopping up the meristematic tissue, or growing point, thus inducing numerous growing points (pups) rather than the single growing point inherent to members of the Ensete genus. No plant would take kindly to this, but as evidenced by another post on the subject, it does work. One would still be taking a risk, I would think, as they could go overboard and completely destroy the growing point and get nothing but a mutilated banana for their efforts. So, in the immortal words of Clint Eastwood in Dirty Harry, ask yourself, "Do I feel lucky? Well, do ya, punk?" It would be a cool experiment if you have an extra you're willing to experiment on. Please keep us posted on what you decide to do.

Re: Can you chop ensete glaucum to get pups?
 

Go for it Sandy, if you kill it I'll send you one of mine (4months old now). It's in the interest of science!

Re: Can you chop ensete glaucum to get pups?
 

In one word: No. It's been tried, and doesn't work on any other Ensete. Even E. gilletii, which some think is just a variety of E. ventricosum, doesn't respond to this treatment either. Heck, I can't even get E. ventricosum to do it.

Frank

Re: Can you chop ensete glaucum to get pups?
 

Interesting. I wonder why it wouldn't work on other Ensete species? This is exactly why I wouldn't try it unless I had a spare I was willing to sacrifice to the experiment.

Re: Can you chop ensete glaucum to get pups?
 

Hey Frank, no harm in trying, rite? I guess the only harm is on the sacrificial victim. Then again.....in the interest of science...

Re: Can you chop ensete glaucum to get pups?
 

I'm going to put it into a bigger pot and let it get rooted in real good and try it this spring. Maybe this summer/fall. No reason to try it now when the plant is already stressed by growing it in Indiana where it's not supposed to be. But I am going to try it....so I'll let you know. Unless someone else wants to be brave and try it first.

Re: Can you chop ensete glaucum to get pups?
 

Sandy, I now have all the 5 species - E galucum - E ventricosum - E superbum - E livingstonianum - E pererii - but they are still young as they were germinated by seed. Even after you do it, I will follow up on all 5 species. Let's see how they fare in the tropical climate here. Thanks for your E maurelli experiment and now this one.

It's worth a shot as they don't pup and sometimes the sds are not easy to come by.

Re: Can you chop ensete glaucum to get pups?
 

Tog, you're missing one...

Or two, depending on what literature you read.

Frank

Re: Can you chop ensete glaucum to get pups?
 

Ya, at least E. homblei and E. gilletii, maybe? E. livingstonianum is listed as valid (along with many many invalid names) in the IPNI, but if you read up on the literature you will see it is quite obscure and the information that is known about it doesn't lead to anything spectacular. It will be interesting to see what these E. livingstonianum seeds grow up to be like. E. ventricosum is an extremely diverse species, with many different wild and cultivated forms, so its possible it could be one of those.

Re: Can you chop ensete glaucum to get pups?
 

And don't forget Ensete Montbeliardii Tog.

I have treid a couple of times with Glaucums and also plain Ventricosum, No luck with any of them. I was considering trying my Monty, But I only have two and they are fairly hard to find.

Re: Can you chop ensete glaucum to get pups?
 

I always have such variable results in germinating seeds, even of these which are supposedly easy. One year, I have 20/100, next year, not a sprout. I can't figure it out. I thought maybe chopping them could turn out to be a more reliable way to get pups.

Re: Can you chop ensete glaucum to get pups?
 

I was actually referring to Ensete wilsonii, which is listed as a valid species in the Flora of China. And yes on the E. homblei. One of the more intriguing Ensetes, probably just because nobody has it yet, lol.

Re: Can you chop ensete glaucum to get pups?
 

Yo Frank, sorry my mistake, I meant all the 5 which have sds available in the market. Ensete homblei, slurp.. I have been after this one for a longtime. I asked Toby of rps and he said he has contacted someone in Zambia. Let's see what happens then. He is also on the track of the Ensete wilsonii too. Can't wait, jus can't wait!:ha:

Re: Can you chop ensete glaucum to get pups?
 

Yup, there are maybe 20 cultivated forms, not sure about the status of the wild forms. I'm trying to source some from the Ethiopians at the moment.it's like dealing with the Chinese..... we'll see.

Re: Can you chop ensete glaucum to get pups?
 

can you tissue culture them like musa?

Re: Can you chop ensete glaucum to get pups?
 

yes

Re: Can you chop ensete glaucum to get pups?
 

BUMP! Sorry...had to bump this up from the murky depths. Was this every tried? I'd be really interested on whether such a thing works for E. Glaucum or E. Superbum. Right now, I have an E. Maurelii and a very small E. Superbum. I'm a huge fan of ensetes...they're very beautiful plants! I especially like the gentle, sweeping curves of E. Glaucum. For some reason, seeing pictures of them always makes me smile!

Aight...just wanted to see if anyone tried this and what the results (if any) were.

Re: Can you chop ensete glaucum to get pups?
 

I got a couple of these pups from Sandy and one sprouted its own pup. I'm sure it was way down there before hand but so unexpected,pretty cool I think.

Re: Can you chop ensete glaucum to get pups?
 

What species....glaucum? Or Maurelii? Or something else?

Re: Can you chop ensete glaucum to get pups?
 

I think this is e glaucum growing in the grounds of a Thai restaurant here in the DR, with what looks like a pup next to one of them. Is this like yours Bob? Mark - this is the one I tried to show you but they were closed.

Re: Can you chop ensete glaucum to get pups?
 

Cool! Thanks for sharing....so there IS hope the, huh?

Re: Can you chop ensete glaucum to get pups?
 

Wish I knew for sure - mine are only just past the sprouted seed stage.

Re: Can you chop ensete glaucum to get pups?
 

Last winter i put my glaucum in the greenhouse. It died down, and i thought it was a goner. I put the pot on my deck as soon as it got warm enough. It came back up, along with a pup.

Re: Can you chop ensete glaucum to get pups?
 

So there is hope - and congratulations - they are lovely plants!!

Re: Can you chop ensete glaucum to get pups?
 

Island Cassie actually mine was an E maurelii (my mistake)but yeah it looks similar. I can't take picture of it yet though since it's in the middle of a tomato garden. The pup is shaded and not as big. The plant is I guess about 4' and 7 overall. Here is the post

ensete maurelii red-creating pups ( 1 2 3)

Re: Can you chop ensete glaucum to get pups?
 

I never did get around to chopping that ensete down because it got sold instead. I need some nice fresh seed to try....in a few years.

Re: Can you chop ensete glaucum to get pups?
 

All Ensete are generally solitary so I can only assume that some injury must have occured to the growing point in order for a pup to sprout on the ones you all mentioned died back and then came up with a pup. Of course, we are talking about nature here and we all know sometimes strange things happen...so who knows for sure. On the TC'd ones I wonder if the TC could even cause pupping on a plant that normally would not pup?

Re: Can you chop ensete glaucum to get pups?
 

I'm sure that the tc chemicals cause them to pup more. I bought some bordelon tc's this spring and they must have overloaded them on whatever chemical causes them to go into the multiplication stage. I still have some of them in the greenhouse because I yellow-tagged them (means hands off--they're mine) in the greenhouse so I can split them up. They have like 8-10 plants roughly the same size coming up in the pots, like a mini clump. I had a margarita that did the same thing and I split it up and made like 10 more out of it. I still have one of them like that too.
I wonder what chemical that is and what would happen if you hit, say an ae ae with it?

Re: Can you chop ensete glaucum to get pups?
 

I have an Ensete Glaucum from seed that's about 1.5 years old and threw a pup! The seeds were from Bananatree.com. Here is a picture of the banana, this photo does not show the pup. The small banana next to the Ensete is a musa itinerans. I will post the pup photo tomorrow after I photograph it in the morning.

Re: Can you chop ensete glaucum to get pups?
 

Are you positive that is E. glaucum? Doesn't really look like mine at all.

Re: Can you chop ensete glaucum to get pups?
 

Not positive. Seeds were from bananatree. Here's another image from earlier this summer. The banana has been grown in full Florida sun. When I lived in CR my bananas looked different than they do down here. Post some pictures of your Ensete Glaucum, we can compare.

Re: Can you chop ensete glaucum to get pups?
 

Not Glaucum, not sure what it is, but definately not glaucum.

The pup is a clue.

Having thought about it, I think it looks like a burmese blue and your itinerans is probably a yunnanensis

Re: Can you chop ensete glaucum to get pups?
 

Here's mine at the end of the summer.


Note the upright stature and very waxy white pstem which is characteristic of glaucum.

Re: Can you chop ensete glaucum to get pups?
 

Thanks Jmoore, the little banana on the left was from seed too, seeds were sold to me as a Musa itinerans (Burmese Blue) from rarepalmseeds.com. The banana had amazing color when it was a pup.

Thanks for posting Bryan, that Ensete is beautiful.

Re: Can you chop ensete glaucum to get pups?
 

Thanks! Wish it still looked that full. It lost all its leaves for some reason when I transplanted it and moved it in for winter. It has since sent out three leaves and looks decent, but it isn't quite the same. I'm sure it will look very nice next summer.

Re: Can you chop ensete glaucum to get pups?
 

I'm glad it's recovering. Should have a good head start for spring and summer when it goes back outside. Here's the unknown pup pushing through the mulch.