Basjoofriend

Hi,

I have already ordered seeds from Musa hirtii and peekelii from Rarepalmseeds and Sunshine Seeds, one must have for me. They also have edible fruits, which are very interesting. Did anyone grow they from seed successfully and does anyone have plants?

Best wishes
Basjoofriend

jmoore

Good luck with the growing of those seeds, I'd be interested to see how many germinate.

I would love to see some photos of your plantation in Brazil, have you had any success in producing any crosses or seeds from your plants?

Regards

Basjoofriend

Hi jmoore,

now I planted different wild species at my pond in my yard in Brazil, one special garden for the wild species of Musa. There are bananas thriving very well because of the canopy of trees and high groundwater level by the pond. I already have planted there into the special garden Musa balbisiana, mannii, ornata, ornata x velutina, velutina, formosana, itinerans, microcarpa, schizocarpa, gigantea ssp. xishuangbannaensis, siamensis "Thai Gold", zebrina, Burmese Blue, sikkimensis and basjoo "Sakhalin" from Baldur Garten, also Ensete ventrichosum. My housekeeper has planted three Nanição alias Dwarf Cavendish there 3 years ago, they grew very well and were the biggest of my garden, even one has fruited last year, but the frost of 28F on 28th June 2011 killed the fruits, but all of the bananas there at the pond were came back very well. Some days ago I have cleaned the place of one large dead tree which has died by frost. My housekeeper has cutten the dead tree completly and I wasted the branches and the trunk of the dead tree, so that the place is now clean. I have already planted Musa zebrina and Burmese Blue there, but there is still place for more wild species like Musa campestris, thomsonii, sikkimensis, laterita, peekelii, hirta and more. So 8 to 10 plants more. And I saw that one Musa "São Tomé" is grown much better in the shadow of one tree at my house in the red claw, another "Säo Tomé" had problems in the sun in the red clay, so that I have transplanted it now into the canopy of one mango tree at the vegetable garden of my housekeeper so that it will do better. I will take some new photos of my banana special garden at the pond soon.

And my friend Helton got some pups of my basjoo, now he has 6 plants. He and I will breed with Musa basjoo. I self have 5 plants of Musa basjoo, one motherplant and 3 pups in Brazil and one grandmaplant in Germany, I took one pup from Germany 3 years ago to Brazil. I do not know whether Musa peekelii and hirta might be crossable with Musa basjoo, but I will try ist. But at first I will try to cross Musa basjoo with itinerans, sikkimensis, Mysore, balbisiana and microcarpa, later also with schizocarpa, peekelii and hirta.

Best wishes
Joachim

Clinton3666

All seeds of musa species at rarepalmseeds.com, are stale & dead now.
over 6 months ago I bought the seeds of musa hirta & campestris, musa voonii, from rarepalmseeds.com, but all seeds never germinated.

Basjoofriend

This is the problem! But Helton managed to germinate Musa campestris and schizocarpa! He got 1 Musa campestris and 3 Musa schizocarpa. Now I have planted Musa schizocarpa at my pond, they are growing well. And Musa campestris has already suckered in the nursery of Helton. Helton is one Brazilian nurseryman of Frutas Raras. Helton will separate the sucker from Musa campestris and I will plant the sucker in next November here at the pond into my banana special garden. Also Helton did not manage to get seedlings from the other banana species from rarepalmseeds.de. Now I do not only order seeds from rarepalmseeds, however I also order from other suppliers, e. g. sementes.de, sunshine-seeds.de and some others. It is better to order same species from different suppliers, this I said to Helton, this will improve the chance to get plants from the rarest banana species. The germinate rates are very different, this might be from the different seed storage methods by the suppliers, so I surmise. Seeds should be stored in the refrigerator at +4C, very cool, frostfree and dry, then they will stay fertile for much longer time. I have stored seeds for some years in the refrigerator and send then to Helton, e. g. seeds from Pinus canariensis, now they germinated and Helton gave me the seedlings back and I could planted Pinus canariensis into my yard out. Pinus canariensis is not hardy in Germany, but in Brazil yes. Helton and I now offer seeds from Musa yunnanensis and velutina, the seeds from Helton are always fresh harvested, this give one higher germinate rate, Frutas Raras does ship seeds worldwide but not to Australia and France. I do work in the international business for Frutas Raras from Germany (German PayPal and bank in Germany), because in Brazil is no PayPal and he does not speak German and only bit English, I do speak German, Portuguese, English and a bit Spanish. In the future Frutas Raras will also offer seeds from Musa basjoo and schizocarpa in some years if we manage to get Musa basjoo and schizocarpa fruiting in Brazil. And more later perhaps also seeds from hardy banana hybrids. But I am also interested who has germinated Musa peekelii and hirta from other suppliers successfully!

Best wishes
Basjoofriend