Musa Ingens

[ZPalms]

23 hours ago, subsonicdrone said:

couldnt tell you about the root hardiness as i bring mine in each year although i lost mine last winter and i bought two more a couple months ago

Oh wow that's really tall, How do you over winter them inside? do you have tall ceilings or do you lean them on there side?

I think I'll get a musa basjoo as a established plant then I'll go ahead and try Thai black along with ensete ventricosum because that looks so interesting on google images super massive trunk

[subsonicdrone]

last winter i kept it in the front hallway which is two stories but it didnt get enough light and maybe not enough water either

it was still alive when i brought it out in the spring and i think if i had cut it down shorter it may have pulled through

it tried to put out a leaf but stalled and rotted

the year before it went from 2 feet tall in the spring to 15 feet tall in 4 months

the basjoo this year went from below ground to 15 feet in 4 or 5 months      

 

i saw a pic of a large maurelli on the forum here but just spent a little while trying to find it but i could not find it

i did however come across another pic of a nice one in this thread... nice maurelli Will Simpson!

the other one i was trying to find was against the house and the same person posted a pic of a nice sized trachycarpus (if i remember correctly) in the same spot

here are some pics from the web showing how big ensete ventricosum can get (not mine)

http://www.costaricaphotos.com/images/obgrabber/2015-06/04a390bf63_thumb_medium728_546.jpeg

https://i0.wp.com/botany.one/wp-content/uploads/2019/07/enset-scale.jpg?resize=982%2C1080&ssl=1

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/4c/Flore_des_serres_v14_065a.jpg

maurelli are pretty common... the ones i picked up in the fall are being stored dormant in the basement

 

[Merlyn]

Ensete Ventricosum and Maurelli are really great plants.  I had several Maurelli (bought from Lowe's or HD) and the problem I had was crown rot in the summer.  They'd get up to 15-20' tall and then just die one day.  I think they didn't like the daily afternoon thunderstorms.  I read that people do great with them in CA and dry areas (with sufficient watering) but just maybe not in rainy/swampy areas like central FL.

[ZPalms]

If they don't like excess moisture then they probably would like it here either but maybe the Ensete Ventricosum would be ok?

If anyone has masu basjoo pup they wanna sell me I'd apperciate it! 🥺

Edited January 15, 2023 by ZPalms

[Merlyn]

@ZPalmsI am just guessing that Maurelii doesn't like the daily afternoon thunderstorms.  The native range is the entire Eastern side of Africa, but the Maurelii version is a cultivar from Ethiopia.  It might be that the tissue-cultured type has some "issues" with crown rot.  I read that happens sometimes with tissue culture, where entire crops will just randomly die.  Or maybe the plant they used to start the culturing had low resistance to crown rots.  They used to have this all over HD/Lowe's around here, but pretty much stopped carrying them in the last 2 years.  They looked crappy in the local Lowe's and ended up in the 50% off area all the time.  If you grow them from seed that might not be an issue.

[aussiearoids]

Anyone wanting a really big banana ... try Saba ..it gets to 30'  and is known as the largest growing 'commercial' banana.

It is a plantain type and very popular in the Phillipines

[ZPalms]

4 hours ago, aussiearoids said:

Anyone wanting a really big banana ... try Saba ..it gets to 30'  and is known as the largest growing 'commercial' banana.

It is a plantain type and very popular in the Phillipines

I wouldn't mind trying one of these but only if their root hardy so If I fail it will still come up again 😍

[ZPalms]

I received my 2 ingens seeds, I'm gonna try and sprout them soon so wish me luck 😂

Edited January 19, 2023 by ZPalms

[Merlyn]

@ZPalms Saba and Kandarian grew back from a couple of freezes just like my others.  Saba did not like being transplanted the second time.  I checked my yard layout and the one I have left is Kandarian.  Both are monsters.

[ZPalms]

1 hour ago, Merlyn said:

@ZPalms Saba and Kandarian grew back from a couple of freezes just like my others.  Saba did not like being transplanted the second time.  I checked my yard layout and the one I have left is Kandarian.  Both are monsters.

What was your lowest temperature?

[Merlyn]

14 hours ago, ZPalms said:

What was your lowest temperature?

Kandarian and Saba routinely grew back from about 27-30F.  Saba died of transplant rot before my coldest temps.  So the Kandarian came back fine from ~26F with frost.  That's as cold as it's gotten here.

[ZPalms]

8 hours ago, Merlyn said:

Kandarian and Saba routinely grew back from about 27-30F.  Saba died of transplant rot before my coldest temps.  So the Kandarian came back fine from ~26F with frost.  That's as cold as it's gotten here.

Maybe I’ll be ok with getting these as that’s the averages I get but I do get frost often but mulching over should help 😍

[johnnymak]

On 1/19/2023 at 7:55 AM, aussiearoids said:

Anyone wanting a really big banana ... try Saba ..it gets to 30'  and is known as the largest growing 'commercial' banana.

It is a plantain type and very popular in the Phillipines

I've just ordered some, so will see how they go, do you have any experience growing them?

[aussiearoids]

sABA CAN BE HARD TO HARVEST 

no drama growing it .. best to chop stem very high up so bunch does not hit the ground

 

[subsonicdrone]

check out this new publication

 

http://www.bananas.org/f2/new-publication-wild-bananas-54151.html

[ZPalms]

9 hours ago, subsonicdrone said:

check out this new publication

 

http://www.bananas.org/f2/new-publication-wild-bananas-54151.html

This is awesome! Thanks! I really wanted newer information on musa ingens and it’s a treasure of information on other bananas!

[PalmsandLiszt]

19 hours ago, subsonicdrone said:

check out this new publication

 

http://www.bananas.org/f2/new-publication-wild-bananas-54151.html

I just get 'The requested URL /f2/new-publication-wild-bananas-54151.html was not found on this server.' for this link.

[Merlyn]

@PalmsandLisztit works for me, odd.  You can try the direct link to the research paper:

https://musanet.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/The_Wild_Bananas_FINAL_highres_2.pdf

[PalmsandLiszt]

17 hours ago, Merlyn said:

@PalmsandLisztit works for me, odd.  You can try the direct link to the research paper:

https://musanet.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/The_Wild_Bananas_FINAL_highres_2.pdf

Many thanks, that one works. Really excellent document! Even has a photo of a mature M. boman for which I searched in vain.

The original link still doesn't work and the bananas.org homepage only displays an 'Apache 2 Test Page' for me; I even tried VPNing from different locations in case it was geo-locked. I have no idea why this should be the case if it's accessible to you.

[Hardypalms]

On 1/5/2023 at 9:20 AM, Merlyn said:

I researched it back when I was into big bananas, but found that they couldn't handle Florida hot humid summer nights.  As I recall, they were difficult to sprout from seed and don't cluster profusely like a lot of bananas.  That might explain why it's not grown in a lot of places.

Aren’t all bananas hard from seeds?

 

Pat

[subsonicdrone]

they can be but if you look at the pdf and skip to the page for musa ingens (181) some researchers found the only way they could get them beyond seedlings was to air condition them overnight

[Hardypalms]

That’s interesting!

Pat

[Bigfish]

On 1/7/2023 at 8:22 AM, Bill H2DB said:

  Here is one place that sells the plant itself .  $40 + Shpg.    ............

 

https://www.ebay.com/itm/174441594599

 

 

Scammers.  A lot of those pictures are something else completely.

On 1/5/2023 at 7:57 AM, ZPalms said:

 

That huge banana picture has been going around for years, and is very fake.  Musa ingens fruit is actually pretty small and full of seeds.