Separating bananas

[Fishboy]

I've got a mass of banana plants that I want to separate. The mass is about 30 inches across and four or six large plants with a dozen or so smaller ones. My instinct is to dig about a foot from the plant base to gather as much root as reasonable and rock the plants to roll them to one side. I'd then use a pair of garden forks to pry the plants apart. How's that?

The problem is, I haven't dug a banana and I don't know what to expect. Any advice is greatly appreciated.

Mahalo nui loa,
Brian and Mary
Lynnwood, WA\Discovery Harbour

[missydog1]

I think it's better to separate out the keiki for your new planting area rather than to move the largest stalks. Mature banana stalks die after they fruit and I have never tried to move a mature plant. The keiki grow fast.

I generally separate plants like that with a spade shovel thrust through the root vertically -- rather than expecting them to come apart with a fork as if they had entangled roots. The roots between parent and keiki are attached underground, as the plant spreads by suckering.

[jdirgo]

Wish I could take credit for this but it was written for another website I run.

Written by Bill Cullum...

So, what's the scoop with bananas, anyway? Do you really need to do much, or can you do a few simple things to improve your quality and yield? They seem to be doing fine, but what's all that stuff about thinning the suckers and leaving the swords, anyway? It's really simple.

All banana keiki are known as suckers. This term is regularly used in horticulture to indicate a shoot growing from the root or lower stem of a plant. Bananas grow from a corm, a fleshy, thickened root. The root mat (underground portion of a banana clump) sends up many new suckers in response to the availability of water and nutrients. But too many suckers spoil the party, and you end up with smaller, lower quality bananas and racks. So ya thin 'em, brah!

Young bananas are called peepers. Larger stalks are known as maidenheads. As they get older, they take one of two forms: either shorter thicker stalks with with wide, rounded leaves or taller, tapering stalks with narrow, strap-like leaves, called swords.

You should remove the suckers with rounded leaves, because they take longer to produce than the swords. Either cut them down, or dig the sucker up to plant elsewhere. Try to thin the suckers before they get taller than two feet. To keep your clump healthy, limit it to two larger, fruiting stalks and two younger replacement stalks.

Bananas need at least 60 inches of rain a year to perform well, so supplemental irrigation can't hurt if you're in one of the drier areas of our island. They are also heavy feeders, especially nitrogen and potassium, so a good well-rounded fertilizer like chicken manure, kitchen compost or 10-5-20 will help produce a quality crop.

When its time to harvest, just cut halfway through the stalk, fold it over and cut off the rack (a.k.a. a bunch in the industry, the clusters of individual bananas are called "hands". Cut down the old stalk and let it compost at the base of the clump.
Laters! And happy gardening until next time.

John Dirgo, R, ABR, e-PRO
Aloha Coast Realty, LLC
808-987-9243 cell
http://www.alohacoastrealty.com

[Fishboy]

Kathy and John,
Thanks so much for your responses. Would it surprise you that my bananas are in Seattle? There are so many hybrids and varieties these days. I've also got two varieties of hibiscus and a fan palm. Just can't help myself.

Regarding the banana, this one is called Hardy Banana and it's hardy to about 10 degrees. I wrap it with chicken wire and pack in leaves each fall season to keep the upper twenty or so inches from freezing to the ground. This variety will produce fruit, but only if the season is exceptionally long and warm; fat chance. I have been collecting the keiki as they've been coming up, and I've given a bunch to friends and put them elsewhere in the yard as well.

From what you guys have told me, I need to just leave the larger plants in the ground and continue to separate off the small ones; gosh knows there's no shortage!

Mahalo nui loa,
Brian and Mary
Lynnwood, WA\Discovery Harbour