29 Banana Plant Facts That Will Definitely Make You Go'Bananas'

The banana plant is a perennial herb, while the fruit is classed as a berry.

A cluster of bananas is referred to as a hand, while a single banana is referred to as a finger. According to the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization, there are about 1,000 types of bananas in the globe.

The banana plant is the largest flowering herbaceous plant on the planet. The above-ground section of a banana tree develops from a structure known as a corm. Banana plants have often been confused as trees because they are large and solid, but what looks to be a core is a false stem or pseudostem.

Banana is a fruit of the genus Musa, which belongs to the Musaceae family, and is one of the largest and most important fruit crops. The banana is native to the tropics, and while it's most commonly consumed there, it is prized globally for its flavor, nutritional content, and year-round availability.

The most frequent way to consume Cavendish or sweet bananas is fresh; however, they can also be grilled or crushed and served in pies or puddings. Muffins, cakes, and bread can also be flavored with them.

The History Of Bananas

Bananas were first discovered in Southeast Asia, primarily in India. In 327 B.C., Arab rulers brought them west from Asia Minor to Africa, where they were carried to the New World by the first adventurers and missionaries to the Caribbean.

Bananas were first mass-produced in 1834, and their popularity increased in late 1880. Bananas were brought to the New World from the Canary Islands immediately after the discovery of America, where they were first planted in Haiti and the Dominican Republic, and quickly spread to other islands and the mainland.

The current banana is seedless; however, it wasn't always like this. Wild bananas used to contain numerous, large, and indigestible seeds inside them. Humans cultivated bananas centuries ago when farmers combined several species of wild bananas to produce seedless bananas.

There are several different seedless bananas, but the Cavendish banana is the most popular. Because of the method used to manufacture them, nearly all varieties are genetically identical. Bananas are grown using a technique known as vegetative propagation since their seeds are practically invisible.

Having similar genetic plants can be useful; for example, you can buy a huge quantity of bananas and be confident that each one will be similar in taste. However, it is because of this genetic resemblance that bananas are endangered.

The Panama Disease, caused by the Fusarium fungus, drove off the Gros Michel banana from markets in 1940, even though it was the most popular cultivar.

Farmers switched to Cavendish bananas, which we have now. Despite having a more distinct flavor than Gros Michel bananas, they had one significant advantage for farmers: they were resistant to Panama Disease.

This popular fruit is still in danger. A form of Fusarium, termed Tropical Race 1, was responsible for the extinction of Gros Michel bananas. Today, Tropical Race 4 is threatening banana crops, and Cavendish bananas aren't resistant to it.

Maintaining Your Banana Patch

Water shortage is the most frequent cause of banana death. The most prevalent reason for not receiving fruit is hunger, and also strong winds can knock banana plants over.

Start removing any dead leaves and chop down any dead plants as needed. If you eliminate all unneeded suckers and keep only the healthiest, you'll obtain larger fruit. You can keep two healthy, robust plants after the initial planting.

It is preferred to preserve one sucker per plant on average. If you don't, your field will get overcrowded. Suckers with short spear-shaped leaves are a better option than suckers with large circular leaves.

Whenever you cut bunches, apply fertilizer occasionally to replenish what you removed. Since bananas are high in potassium, a potassium-rich fertilizer should be used. Because bananas have small root systems, apply the fertilizer near their stems.

How To Grow Banana Plants And Keep Them Happy

Here are some important banana facts that will help to grow your banana plants easily:

Look up the temperature and humidity in your region. The humidity level should be at least 50% and as consistent as possible.

The ideal daily temperature is between 78.8-86 F (26-30 C), with nighttime temperatures no lower than 68 F (20 C). Appropriate conditions are warm, rarely falling below 57.2 F (14 C) or rising above 93.2 F (34 C).

Because bananas might take over a year to develop fruit, it's crucial to know what temperature range they'll be exposed to throughout the year. Banana plants will immediately stop growing if the temperature drops below 57.2 F (14 C).

Choose a location that has good drainage. Bananas demand a certain level of water; however, if the water does not drain properly, the bananas will spoil.

Drainage can be improved by using a raised garden bed or adding 20% perlite to the soil. This is especially critical if you're working with a banana plant that doesn't have any leaves or had them cut for transportation. Leaves aid in the evaporation of surplus moisture.

Make sure you have enough room. Although banana plants are technically herbs, they are frequently misidentified as trees for a variety of reasons. You should check the source of your banana plant or contact local banana farmers for a more exact estimate of the locale and variety.

Banana Plant Care

Choose your planting medium. A banana sucker can be obtained from another farmer, plant nursery, or purchased online. Suckers develop from the base of a banana stem or corm. Tissue cultures are created in laboratories to increase the fruit set.

Trim the plant as needed. Remove any areas of the plant that are dead, insect-eaten, rotted, or discolored. If the majority of the plant is harmed, remove it from other plants and replace it with new planting material.

Then drill a trench for each plant. Trim any plants or weeds from the planting area before digging a circular hole. A bigger trench will provide the plant with more nourishment, but it will also require more soil.

Fill the hole mainly with loose, rich soil. To improve drainage, leave a few inches of room at the top.

Fertilize once a month at a spacing of a few feet from the root. Use fertilizer from the market, manure, compost, or a combination of such. After planting, apply fertilizer in an even ring around the banana plant, and repeat every month.

Water the banana plant regularly, but not excessively. Excessive moisture can cause the roots to rot, although underwatering is a typical cause of banana plant death.

Also, mulch the area, remove any dead leaves or banana trees, and break them up to use as a border for live plants. Other yard trash and wood ash can also be used to replenish the soil's nutrients.

To enhance the fruit set and growing conditions, once your plant's suckers have reached maturity and already have several suckers, remove all except one sucker. Cut off excess suckers at ground level, and the uncovered plant should be covered with soil. If they regrow, repeat with a bigger incision.

Pay attention to a purple flower in bloom. Under optimal conditions, a banana plant would flower in six to seven months, but it could take up to a year depending on the weather.

Allow the petals to fall away, revealing bananas. This could take another two months or more. Every single banana is referred to as a finger and each connected bunch of bananas is a hand.

Remove the excess sections once all of the bunches have been shown. The hand should die on its own, but cutting the flower bud will allow the plant to focus more energy on fruit production.

When the blossoms or plant dies, it's time to harvest your bananas. The small bloom at the end of each banana will dry out and fall off, or the banana plant will lose a majority of its leaves.

Banana Tree Facts

The first fact about banana trees that most people are unaware of is that bananas do not grow on trees. A majority of people mistake a banana plant for a tree when they encounter one. It is, however a plant or more precisely, a huge herb.

Although the plant's stem resembles a tree trunk, it truly lacks a visible stem (known as an aerial stem) or trunk. The plant's actual stem is buried beneath the ground. The portion we call the stem or trunk is a bundle of leaves tucked into a tight wrapping.

The stem and banana leaves develop upwards from the ground. Newer leaves move older leaves out of the way, creating a succession of crescents that cross-sectionally resemble an onion. This is known as a pseudostem or false stem.

Bananas are cultivated in over 150 countries and come in over 1000 different kinds. Cavendish bananas are the most commercialized cultivar, accounting for over 50% of all production worldwide.

The world's biggest banana producers are India and China. India produces 29 million tons each year on average, while China produces 11 million tons. Philippines, Ecuador, and Brazil are other major producers.

Bananas are linked to lilies and orchids. They are also related to ginger and cardamon. This is because bananas belong to the Zingiberales flowering plant family.

Some scientists speculate that banana peels may have the capability to extract heavy metal contamination from river water, similar to other purification materials. In Ibn al-'Awwam's 12th century agricultural treatise, 'Book Of Agriculture', an essay on banana trees cultivation is mentioned.

Members of the plantain subgroup of banana cultivars, which is an important food in West Africa and Latin America, have long pointed fruit that fits the Chiquita description. Ploetz et al.

refer to them as genuine plantains, as opposed to other types of cooking bananas. East African cooking bananas belong to a separate group, the East African Highland bananas, and therefore would not be considered genuine plantains under this classification.

The skin of a ripe banana in a banana plantation blackens at 39.2 F (4 C). When ripe bananas are exposed to ultraviolet light, they illuminate, according to a 2008 study.

The collapse of 60% of coral reefs along Costa Rica's beaches is thought to be due in part to sediments from banana plantations.

Green bananas used for cooking are the most common varieties in many tropical nations. Wild banana genes are conserved as DNA and cryopreserved pollen. Wild species seeds are conserved less frequently because they are difficult to regenerate.

Yellow bananas, on the other hand, have a sweeter flavor due to their increased sugar content. They usually grow in tropical countries.

A banana is an elongated, edible fruit that is produced by numerous species of herbaceous flowering plants belonging to the Musa genus. Bananas are usually eaten raw.

The bright yellow color that most people associate with supermarket bananas comes from an artificial ripening process. Infected banana leaves used as packing material have caused the spread of Black Sigatoka to banana plantations throughout the tropics.

Bananas were brought to South America by Portuguese sailors in the 16th century, who transported the fruit from West Africa. Bananas have a high nutritional value.

The corm of a mature banana plant stops producing new leaves and begins to create a flower spike, also known as an inflorescence. Bananas have cultivated varieties and need cool weather to grow.

Bananas are a popular fruit rich in vitamin C, helps with maintaining blood pressure, and aids in preventing fungal disease. For safety, banana bunches are frequently enclosed in plastic bags to make them healthy enough for our blood pressure.