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Thursday, October 11, 2012

Progress of the musa mekong giant "itinerans"

I tried purchasing musa mekong giant last year however they never made it through the winter when I tried planting them outside. The appeared to still be alive by the spring time however too much moisture in the spring must have killed them out so I ended up ordering a couple more of them from eBay this spring. Here's the links to when I tried them last fall.
http://stevespeonygarden.blogspot.com/2011/10/new-banana-plants-musa-mekong-giant.html

http://stevespeonygarden.blogspot.com/2011/10/fall-update-on-banana-plants-2.html

I bought them as tiny plants in 2 inch pots some time in April of this year to replace the ones I lost last fall.

3 May 2012

Plant 1 on the right, and plant 2 on the left.








30 June 2012: Both of them filled out their pots so I planted them in the ground about 76-12 inches deep.

Plant 1
Plant 2







28 July 2012
Getting up to 2ft tall.
Plant 1
Plant 2




18 August 2012
Getting up to 3ft tall
Plant 1
Plant 2






24 August 2012
Getting up near 4ft tall
Plant 1


23 September 2012
They are breaking the 6ft mark now, and starting to produce pups
Plant 2 on right

Plant 2's pup

Plant 1's pups





3 October 2012
With the cooler weather, these guys aren't getting that much more than 6ft for this year by approximately 3 inches in diameter. I gave away one of the pups on plant 1 to even it up. I also added a nice layer of leaf mold to improve the soil and provide some protection for winter in advance. Each of these bananas are also starting to run some 2 inch thick rhizomes up to 2ft away.

Plant 1 near side




10 October 2012
Frost is supposed to come by the 12th of October so this is about  the most that they will grow for the year.
Plant 1 near side


4 comments:

  1. Good rates of growth for this year. Looking forward to seeing how they get on next year.

    Gaz Alternative Eden

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I expect about a similar size progression as the basjoo. The only difference is that mekong giant tends to send very long rhizomes and can produce pups as far as 6ft away from the mother plant.

      Delete
  2. can i plant one center of plant 3 feet from front window on my house?

    ReplyDelete
  3. Omg! Finally someone provided a most robust and detail description of the entire process… Thank you so much! Great update

    ReplyDelete