Lowes Ice Cream banana?
 

I just bought a banana at Lowes. The label says Icecream but it has red blotches like a DC or Grand Nain.

Can it really be icecream? It has some "icing" on the p-stem but I have bought icecream from 3 different sources before, Going Bananas, online store and a local nursery that is quite good so either all those are wrong or Lowes is wrong.
However I cant resist the challenge so I bought one at Lowes to try out.
:)

This year the winter was nice here in North Texas so I had the following survive the winter in the ground:
2 iceream with P-stem 5+ feet!
1 Dwarf Orinoco p-Stem 4+ feet
1 Saba p-stem 3 feet
and finally

2 icecream from storage in the garage with 5+ p-stem that planted in the ground.
Unfortunately I learned that no Icecream will survive in the garage lying down so my biggest Icecream stored in the garage for the second year in a row at 6+ feet rotted away...

Hopefully I will get at least one to flower. what d you think, when would an icecream flower, 12 months or more or a specific height?

But unless all of the ones I have are Nam Wah the Lowes one is not an icecream. I will post a picture tomorrow.

Anyone else seen this "Icecream" at Lowes?

Re: Lowes Ice Cream banana?
 

Re: Lowes Ice Cream banana?
 

Ice Cream shouldn't have wine splotches.

Re: Lowes Ice Cream banana?
 

Welcome to big-box bananas.

Re: Lowes Ice Cream banana?
 

Instead of big box they should be "Jack ina Box" cause they don't know Jack about Bananas and you'll always get a surprise when it pops out with a bloom!

Re: Lowes Ice Cream banana?
 

It's probably someone moving dwarf cavendish as Ice Cream. The liners for dwarf cavendish are much much cheaper than even agristarts Ice Cream.

Re: Lowes Ice Cream banana?
 

Just picked one up from home depot. It is a solid deep green in color and looks very healthy.

Re: Lowes Ice Cream banana?
 

Ice Cream bananas should have closed petioles. Cavendish bananas have open petioles. However, the clone that's being sold as Ice Cream everywhere also has closed petioles.

Re: Lowes Ice Cream banana?
 

I saw ensete at home depot label as dwarf cavendish and ensete on the same pot.

Re: Lowes Ice Cream banana?
 

Good chance that any banana you get at a big box store that is not labled Cavendish is wrong. Sometimes your lucky and they will at least call Ensete's "colored banana".
Ice cream bananas are not too easy to get so usually only nice nursuries will have them. Around here I think I would be impressed to see anything other than Cavendish, blood bananas, and Ensetes and the occasional Musa Basjoo.

My ice cream has powedery undersides, closed petioles, and kind of lightish green leaves. Im pretty sure I have a true ice cream banana, but Im always a little paranoid about it!

Re: Lowes Ice Cream banana?
 

The bananas at the southern California big box stores are usually from La Verne Nursery which is pretty reliable in regards to correct labeling.

Re: Lowes Ice Cream banana?
 

What all do u call "big box stores"?

Re: Lowes Ice Cream banana?
 

big box store definition

Web definitions:
A big-box store (also supercenter, superstore, or megastore) is a physically large retail establishment, usually part of a chain. The...
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big-box_store whoohoo :)

Re: Lowes Ice Cream banana?
 

So, in a fact that are regular retail stores?

Re: Lowes Ice Cream banana?
 

Yes:goteam:

Re: Lowes Ice Cream banana?
 

Yes, a big box store is just like a retail store. Except retail stores are usually considered places like Nordstrom, Sears, and Kohls which mostly have household appliances, clothes, and other things like that. Big Box stores are usualy considered places like Home Depot and Lowes which have plants and pretty much anything you would need for a landscaping or construction project.

Re: Lowes Ice Cream banana?
 

In late March I picked up two Grand Nains from Lowes. That's how they were labelled and that's what they look like.

But yeah, in general, the stupid box stores can get things wrong. Calling Med Fan palms Windmills...

Re: Lowes Ice Cream banana?
 

Here is my lowes "Ice Cream" banana; it was shipped to AZ from California. I'd be curious to see what you guys think it is. For reference, that's a 10' wall behind it.

Re: Lowes Ice Cream banana?
 

It's nearly 100 degrees here today, so as you can see it's folded a bit. It will perk up tonight.

Re: Lowes Ice Cream banana?
 

TO ME, regular is not what they are.

A long, long time ago in the country of America,

people known as businessmen would open a store sometimes called a merchantile or general or hardware store. These stores would have at least one of everything and unless one of your neighbors happened to need the same thing recently you could be fairly assured of it being instock. If he didn't have it you'd have to wait about a month till the next shipment came in.

That is my definition of REGULAR.

Moving forward we now have "Big Box Stores" such as Home Depot and Lowes. They have hundreds of the same item and never run out (unless it is something critical to a time sensitive project I'm working on). They can also through their mass purchasing power sell items a lot cheaper than the regular store.

The regular store now is an extinct thing except in the smallest of communities where the Big Box Store cannot do the volume required to make a profit.

DON'T GET ME WRONG!

I am not crying or protesting the Big Box Stores. They are an evolution of the regular stores and are probably necessary. They certainly get a lot of my money. I average between $300 and $1,000 there every month. They have made the difference in whether I can or cannot afford something. Recent case in point. I bought 3 Windmill palms at Home Depot for $600 total. Three years ago I purchased one windmill palm at a local palm supplier that was half as big and paid $350 for one.

Anyway what we have now is not REGULAR but I suppose it is the

NEW REGULAR!

Re: Lowes Ice Cream banana?
 

It does look like my ice cream banana! And definitely dont worry about the leaves folding up. Last summer was so hot here that my ice cream banana folded its leaves every single afternoon no matter how much water I would give it. They seem to fold up more than my other bananas (like Ensete and Saba)

Re: Lowes Ice Cream banana?
 

Your leaves are going to respond to something called a vapor pressure deficit. Basically the stomata and the plant are responding to the difference between the water potential in the plant and in the atmosphere. When the humidity gets to low the plant will close the stomata and fold the leaves. You could mist the plant in the middle of the day to counter the low humidity.

Re: Lowes Ice Cream banana?
 

This looks like my existing IceCream, bright green leaves with no red blotches.
The Lowes Icecream I picked up in Texas has big red blotches like a DC or Gran Nain. Suspect it is one of those two...

Re: Lowes Ice Cream banana?
 

Are the leaf margins pink? Also is the midrib of a newly emerged leaf red? It is on mine.

Re: Lowes Ice Cream banana?
 

I bought 3 of the Lowe's "Ice Cream" bananas. At least I got them 50% off! I do recall they have some blotches on the pstem, but the leaves are all green. I'll post some pictures, I would appreciate some help identifying them!

Re: Lowes Ice Cream banana?
 

Here are some pics of my "ice creams". Looking at them closer, I think I got the same variety as nph, which makes sense considering we are in the same area...







I guess the going theory is gran nain or dwarf cavendish?

Re: Lowes Ice Cream banana?
 

That looks like something in the Cavendish family, not even close to Ice Cream :ha: Still a great plant though.

Re: Lowes Ice Cream banana?
 

Hybridpower, your plant is almost certainly Tall Namwah, which is what most plants sold as Ice Cream in CA are.

Mrthegreek, your plants are almost certainly Dwarf Cavendish, based on the wine splotches and short, open, petioles.

Re: Lowes Ice Cream banana?
 

I have heard that the Ice Creams are slow to produce pups. Not sure if that is true or not, but my case seems to fit. My IC has been in the ground about 10 months now (got the majority of my plants on the same trip thru South Florida), it's p-stem is about 7-8' and it has put out just one pup about 2 months ago (and a little peeper that has not done anything since I found it 4 months back).
On the other hand my Manzano has produced well over a dozen (continually), Dwarf Red produced 9 (continually), Dwarf Namwa produced 4 (all quickly, none recent), Raja Puri has produced 3 (2 quickly, 1 recent), Gran Nain has produced about 8 (continually) and FHIA-17 has produced 3-4 (1 quickly, the rest recent).

DM

Re: Lowes Ice Cream banana?
 

Thanks venturabananas!
The more I looked at pictures of DCs, I was coming to the same conclusion, so you definitely confirmed my suspicions.

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I thought Ice Cream was supposed to be a good pupper. This IC on pitangadiego's site has lots of pups around it.

Re: Lowes Ice Cream banana?
 

Yep that's what I've heard from people who have IC, you guys know Island cassie, she's got one and always seems to have lots of pups. My orinoco I don't know why but no pups from it maybe it has to be a giant first. I'm gonna drive up to lows this afternoon to see if they have any bananas. and HD aswell! and remember the better care you take with the bananas, water, fert sun etc I'm sure the more willing it will be to pup.

Re: Lowes Ice Cream banana?
 

This is off topic, but since I just found out I now have three Dwarf Cavendish and not three Ice Creams (thanks, Lowe's), I am wondering if I should move the one that gets full sun all day to a shadier spot. Of the three I have, two are doing really well, putting out leaves every 5 days, and getting taller, one is putting out leaves half as often, and smaller leaves at that. "The runt", as I like to call it, is the one getting more sun than the others. I did some reading and found that DCs like a bit more shade? There is a spot that I currently have a tiny Basjoo planted and its not thriving as well as the other basjoos that are getting full sun. (I'm trying to grow a tall leafy plant in this spot because it would put something between mine and my next door neighbor's kitchen bay windows) I was just going to switch the "the runt" for the little basjoo. Ideas?

Re: Lowes Ice Cream banana?
 

I saw a couple at lowe's today and they definately weren't DC's. In 2010 my bigger Ice Cream had 4 pups..

Re: Lowes Ice Cream banana?
 

There are Orinocos growing in peoples' yards all over the place here and I've seen huge stands of them. I know that they do produce pups.