Bananas are heavy drinkers and feeders. They perform great in a container and can be grown in a greenhouse or shade house very quickly! Broad, long, graceful leaves and rapid growth, commonly reaching full size in just a few weeks/months, make banana a favourite plant for providing a tropical look to pool and patio areas.
It prefers to grow in average to moist conditions, and shouldn’t be allowed to dry out. It is not particular as to soil type or pH. Grow in full sun to part shade (roots in shade always). Planting in poor, infertile soil may temper somewhat rapid growth habit. Feed with well balanced (N.P.K.) fertilizer with trace (minor) minerals.
Grow in the largest container you can manage to move! Helps prevents plant toppling when in fruit.
The development of bananas follows a frost-free winter. The main stem, enclosed by leaf petioles (the Pseudo-stem) must be kept alive and growing; from this arises the flower bud. The first hands to appear contain female flowers which will develop into bananas (usually seedless, in edible types). The number of hands of female flowers varies from a few to more than 10, after which numerous hands of sterile flowers appear and shed in succession, followed by numerous hands of male flowers which also shed. After fruiting, the mother plant which bore should be cut off near ground level, as it can never produce again.
Pests and Diseases: Musa have few troublesome pests or diseases outside the tropics.
If after a major cold period in which there is no doubt that bananas were killed to the ground, cut the plants off at ground level within a couple of weeks of the freeze. Most bananas will produce the flower bud within 10 to 15 months of emergence as a new sucker. depending mostly on variety and extent of cool/cold weather. These off shoots will form a new rhizome thus creating a new plant.