{"id":2118,"date":"2007-06-05T11:28:22","date_gmt":"2007-06-05T16:28:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/192.168.1.5\/gardens\/gardenlog\/?p=2118"},"modified":"2017-07-19T14:46:34","modified_gmt":"2017-07-19T19:46:34","slug":"banana-plantation-update-2007","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.zanthan.com\/gardens\/garden-design\/banana-plantation-update-2007\/","title":{"rendered":"Banana Plantation: Update 2007"},"content":{"rendered":"

Dateline: June 2, 2006<\/strong>
\nLike so much of my garden, the banana plantation evolved out of unrelated events rather than by forethought or design. Last fall I got the stonework on the front of the house repaired. That so improved the look of the house that the yard looked grungy by comparison. So I cleared the flagstone path of St. Augustine grass which encouraged AJM to move the stones to the backyard and motivated me to buy stones for a new path<\/a>. After Christmas I carted home loads of ground up Christmas trees and and heaped it over the remaining St. Augustine grass and monkey grass.<\/p>\n

\"photo:
2005-10-26. Before.<\/i><\/p>\n

On another front I attempted to divide my Musa lasiocarpa<\/a> because the mother plant had died. Most of the pups snapped off at the root an I thought they were dead. I replanted the largest one in the same place, potted another, and put three more without roots into pots. I put a couple into water in a vase inside the house and threw the rest into the spare shower where they could keep warm over winter. To my amazement they all<\/strong> survived.<\/p>\n

As far as I can tell Musa lasiocarpa is like some large fleshy above-the-ground bulb. The roots anchor it in the soil, but it sure doesn’t need them to live…at least it can get by over the winter.<\/p>\n

Now that it’s warm, all the banana plants were putting out new growth. Where to put them? Ah. Here’s a bare spot. Voila! Banana plantation.<\/p>\n

\"photo:
2006-06-01. After.<\/i><\/p>\n

Still to do: build a short fence to separate the banana plantation from the driveway. I love the little wattle fencing that they make in England. I don’t have a willow tree, though. So I will have to come up with something similar using native materials.<\/p>\n

Update: June 2, 2007<\/strong>
\nIt’s taken almost six months since the first winter freezes for the bananas to start leafing out again. Despite all the water of this very wet spring, it’s temperatures in the 90s that seem to get them going.<\/p>\n

\"photo:
2006-11-27. Just before the first freeze. Notice how this spot goes from full shade to full sun after the leaves fall.<\/i><\/p>\n

\"photo:
2006-11-29. I wrap yellowing leaves around the stalks for extra insulation and then mound up cedar elm leaves to cover the banana stalks.<\/i><\/p>\n

I will have to think what I can plant in the interim period from November to May. Overwintering annuals like snapdragons or violas might be nice as they’re finishing up right about now when the bananas leaf out. However, I do like the simplicity of having just the bananas. Still in winter and spring, until the trees leaf out, this is a very nice sunny area in a prominent place. I should do something more with it. Hmmm…what a wishy-washy gardener I am!<\/p>\n

PS. Austin garden bloggers…for those who want them there’s definitely passalongs in your future.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\"photo:
2007-06-02. A year later. The banana plantation is a success!<\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[8],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.zanthan.com\/gardens\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2118"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.zanthan.com\/gardens\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.zanthan.com\/gardens\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.zanthan.com\/gardens\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.zanthan.com\/gardens\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2118"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.zanthan.com\/gardens\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2118\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5469,"href":"https:\/\/www.zanthan.com\/gardens\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2118\/revisions\/5469"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.zanthan.com\/gardens\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2118"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.zanthan.com\/gardens\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2118"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.zanthan.com\/gardens\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2118"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}